SHAH ALAM: Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak urges Malaysians to make sports part of their culture and lifestyle.
The inaugural National Sports Day, he said, should not be made a one day affair only for Malaysians to come out and indulge in sporting activities.
It should be a made into a daily affair and Malaysians should spend half an hour exercising or doing stretching, at the least, said Najib.
"Khairy (Youth and Sports Minister Khairy Jamaluddin) said Malaysia has yet to become a world class sporting country. At the moment, we are only good at organising sporting events but in terms of competition results, we have yet to achieve the level of a sporting nation," he said.
He cited the example of Australia which has almost the same population as Malaysia but has a bigger domination in sports because of their stronger foundation in sports and its integration into their culture.
"The National Sports Day will fail to achieve its objective unless we become a sporting nation. This is what we have to achieve. If we reach this level, we will produce sporting champions," added Najib.
Najib said this in his speech at the launching of the inaugural National Sports Day at Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM), here, this morning.
Also present were his wife Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor, Khairy, his deputy Datuk M. Saravanan, Higher Education minister Datuk Seri Idris Jusoh as well as UiTM vice chancellor Tan Sri Prof Dr Sahol Hamid Abu Bakar.
Some 20,000 participated in the one-day event at UiTM.
The nationwide event saw the participation of over 4 million Malaysians.
There are also more than 17,000 activities organised to coincide the National Sports Day.