There has been much discussion by the Government and citizens on the topic of fostering racial harmony and religious tolerance in Singapore.
Many of us from the Pioneer and Merdeka generations learnt tolerance and understanding of people from different ethnic and religious backgrounds through sports, when we were growing up in the kampung and in school.
Football was one sport that united us as a team and as one people, irrespective of who we were. From the kampung areas of Newton and Kampong Java in the 1960s emerged the Newtonites football team, which produced seven national football players who were from different ethnic groups.
Similarly, many of us doing part-time national service in the 1970s played for the Special Constabulary (police) football squad, which again was made up of players from the four ethnic groups.
Through football, we became friends, and today we still get together a few times a year to makan (eat) and chit-chat at the Singapore Cricket Club.
I believe we should rekindle and cultivate the kampung spirit from a young age through team sports such as football at the community level, to foster racial and religious tolerance and harmony.
William Liu Wei Hai