Former coach gets jail over conspiracy to falsify finswimming results for SEA Games selection

SINGAPORE: A former finswimming coach at the Singapore Underwater Federation (SUF) was sentenced to one week's jail on Monday (Sep 14) for conspiring with his vice-president and head coach to falsify competition results to secure athletes' selection into the Southeast Asian Games (SEA Games).

Muhammad Faiz Suhaimi, a 33-year-old Singaporean, had earlier pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to make a false electronic record to commit fraud. Two other charges were considered in sentencing.

His alleged co-conspirators are Ho Ho Huat, 56, then the vice-president of sports and head coach of finswimming at SUF, and 36-year-old Gary Lee Quan Hua, then an assistant finswimming coach at SUF.

The falsified documents resulted in six additional athletes being selected to represent Singapore in finswimming at the 2023 SEA Games, including Ho's daughter.

SUF is the national sports association responsible for promoting underwater and aquatic sports in Singapore.

This includes finswimming, where athletes compete using monofins resembling fish tails or bifins as used by scuba dinners.

THE CASE

At the time of the offences, the 32nd SEA Games were due to be held in Cambodia in May 2023.

The Singapore National Olympic Council (SNOC) put in place a selection process and set up a selection committee to determine the athletes to represent Singapore at the games.

During the selection process in December 2022, Ho received a handbook setting out featured sporting events and realised that some finswimming events had been removed.

As a result, some athletes were no longer eligible for selection.

Ho allegedly wanted to nominate more finswimming athletes through the appeal process, which would take place sometime in February 2023 and required a qualifying result in a sanctioned competition for the athletes he wished to nominate.

Ho managed to send five Singaporean athletes for the first Malaysian Fin Swimming Championship in Malaysia in January 2023, although it was meant only for Malaysian swimmers.

No official result sheet was issued to the five male athletes.

After this, Ho allegedly raised the idea of falsifying the Malaysian Championship results with Faiz and Lee.

They hesitated but because Ho was more senior than them and they were afraid to question him, court documents said.

They discussed the qualifying timings, the athletes to nominate and the events, among other things.

Faiz then created a false electronic record of four events at the Malaysian Championship, stating that female athletes had taken part even though only male athletes had gone.

The false record was sent to the sports performance manager of finswimming, intending to induce SNOC to select athletes to represent Singapore in finswimming events at the SEA Games.

Faiz and Ho later agreed to add the falsified results to the official result sheet of the Malaysian Championship when asked for the official results.

The SNOC Appeal Committee eventually selected eight athletes to represent Singapore at the 2023 SEA Games.

Of these, two had already been selected to represent Singapore for another SEA Games event, but the falsified results induced SNOC to select them for an additional event.

The remaining six athletes, including Ho's daughter, would not have been selected without the falsified results.

SNOC incurred an additional expense of about S$15,700 (US$12,360) to send the six athletes to the 2023 SEA Games.

Ho was removed from his position at the SUF in December 2023.

After this, Faiz and Lee informed an anonymous whistleblower about the falsified finswimming results.

SNOC and Sport Singapore later began investigations and a Committee of Inquiry was established to look into the matter.

It found, among other things, that the results had been falsified and that Ho had played a pivotal role in the scheme.

SNOC lodged a police report in March 2025.

The prosecution sought a fine, noting Faiz's voluntary disclosure and position relative to Ho.

Ho and Lee have pre-trial conferences fixed for October.

For conspiring to make a false electronic record to commit fraud, Faiz could have been jailed for up to four years, fined, or both.