Lee Bee Wah: Singaporeans should show solidarity with the Table tennis team

In response to the large amount of criticism of the Singaopre National Table Tennis Team at the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games, Singapore Table Tennis Association President Er Dr Lee Bee Wah, responded by saying that the public should show solidarity with the team.

During the Commonwealth games, many netizens spoke out about how they didn't feel proud of the achievements of the "Singapore" table tennis teams as they felt that the talents had been bought from China.

This is not a completely wrong accusation either as only 1 male and 1 female out of each team of 5 players was actually born in Singapore. The rest were professional table tennis players in China that were brought to Singapore and given citizenship to play for the Singapore national teams.

It was not only Singapore's netizens who were disappointed with the "bought" team. In fact, Australian table tennis start William Henzell also said that it was disappointing and "against the spirit of the games" for Singapore to have bought their team of professional table tennis players.

(See: Australia Table Tennis Star slams Singapore for "buying" medals with PRC players)

In response to the many criticisms, Lee Bee Wah said on Friday before National Day:

"I would think that now that ah…. we are celebrating National Day. I am sure whether we are local born, we are foreign born, we all celebrate National Day together. I’d like to urge everyone to be big-hearted to embrace everyone. Everyone contributed to the growth of Singapore.”