Performers from Vietnam participate in the closing ceremony of the SEA Games (Southeast Asian Games) at the athletics stadium in Clark, Capas, Tarlac province, north of Manila on December 11, 2019. (Photo by TED ALJIBE / AFP)
MANILA, Philippines—The Southeast Asian Games Federation has decided to postpone the 2021 Hanoi Games due to the rising COVID-19 cases in Vietnam, Philippine Olympic President Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino said Thursday.
The biennial regional meet will be held next year instead and the federation is giving Vietnam 10 days to decide on the new date.
“The SEA Games Federation unanimously decided not to hold the SEA Games this year due to COVID-19,” said Tolentino during a virtual press conference. “There was a spike in cases so the entire federation stated that the SEA Games will not be this 2021.”
Vietnam, which kept cases at less than 50 since March of 2020, is now tallying upwards of 1,000 infections daily with the latest count at 1,044 on Wednesday.
Tolentino said that the Vietnamese government has to discuss when it will hold the rescheduled SEA Games with a plausible date happening in early 2022.
The Hanoi SEA Games, Tolentino added, cannot be held in the latter half of 2022 as the Asian Games is scheduled to take place in September of that year.
“They want to hold the SEA Games for 2022 so they are choosing either March, April, or May,” said Tolentino. “We gave them 10 days to decide so we’re kind of pressuring them to decide.”