Spanner in the works

There are just nine days to go before the start of this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival. Are you ready for it? A highlight of this year’s festival programme will be a second visit to our shores by the 12th world chess champion, Anatoly Karpov.

He won’t be playing in any of the tournaments at the festival. Rather, he will be here for only a few days in early September before jetting off elsewhere to continue with his worldwide campaign to become the next president of the World Chess Federation (Fide).

Nevertheless, spectators and participants alike at the Malaysia Chess Festival can expect to bump into the former world champion. If you need him to autograph any of his chess books, this will be an opportunity for you. Chess enthusiasts can also look forward to attend a special subscription-based Buka Puasa function with him on Sep 5.

When I was speaking to the organizers of the festival earlier this week, I was reminded that they were facing possibly the greatest and gravest challenges to their organizational capabilities in the last seven years. 

For the first time since the inception of the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open chess championship in 2004, the organizers are bracing themselves for a rival competition in nearby Philippines to pull away some of the entries.

Yes, there is also an international chess tournament that’s been planned in Manila at almost the same time. Normally, federations would work together to ensure that international tournaments would not overlap. 

It’s not difficult to understand why. If tournaments do not overlap, players – especially the professional chess players – would be easier to persuade to play in these events one after another. It maximizes their investment of time and money to fly into this region to play in the chess competitions, and all organizers are happy with the quality of players that they can attract.  

Not this time. The National Chess Federation of the Philippines (NCFP) has been promised USD100,000 by Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the current Fide president, to hold a tournament in memory of his predecessor, Florencio Campomanes, who died earlier this year.

Now, with Campomanes being a Filipino and all that, there was no way that the NCFP was going to say no to holding this memorial event. But then for some reason, the dates chosen for their event were pushed from mid-August to the end of August. Naturally, this then overlapped substantially with the dates for the Malaysia Chess Festival. 

Some people say that it had been done with a purpose. It’s not that the NCFP is not aware that the Malaysia Chess Festival is an annual event. The festival is already in its seventh year and is well publicized around the world. In the past, Filipino chess players have always turned up to support both the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open and the Merdeka rapid chess team tournaments. 

But not this year. Word has been going around that the NCFP had advised their players in no uncertain terms that they should be playing in Manila instead of Kuala Lumpur. Worse still, there is unconfirmed news that the top Filipino players have been threatened with bans by their federation should they ignore this “advice”.

In all likelihood, the Filipino players will not be here. Certainly, those players who have already been selected by their federation for the Chess Olympiad in Khanty-Mansiysk will not want to jeopardize their selection status. Those players not in the Filipino team can’t be bothered with the ban but they may be attracted to the larger prize moneys at the Campmanes memorial tournament in Manila.

All this is, of course, very sad because if Campomanes were alive today, the last thing he would want was for his memorial tournament to clash with the Malaysian Chess Festival. Campomanes has always been a very good and supportive friend of Malaysia. It was a friendship that started in 1974 and even until last year, he had been a regular visitor here.

But why, you may ask, is the NCFP risking to upset the other federations in the region? The answer may be simply that it all boils down to relationships and the charged atmosphere that’s presently enveloping chess, an atmosphere created by the Fide election campaign. 

In the world of chess, there is a close bond between Fide and the NCFP. It had all started with Campomanes’ own election as Fide president in 1982. The bond remained after Ilyumzhinov took over the Fide reins. Even Campo’s death has not changed this relationship.

It is publicly known that the NCFP is supporting the Ilyumzhinov ticket at the Fide elections next month while Malaysia’s stand has been to side with Karpov. There are claims by Karpov’s team that the Ilyumzhinov team has been going around the world to promise great rewards to national federations that support them.

Whether or not this claim can be substantiated is not for me to say but in the absence of any other explanation, any observer will be guessing that if this claim is true, then there’s every reason for the NCFP to want their Campomanes memorial tournament to succeed at the expense of the Malaysian Chess Festival.  

Nevertheless, the organizers of the Malaysian Chess Festival are quite confident that the Manila event will have little impact on the success of our local festival. 

“We are still enjoying very good response from the foreign players. They know Malaysian hospitality well and they know that when they play here, they are among old friends. Friendship counts a lot among real friends,” said one of the organizers.

Up next  

Malaysia chess festival

Here is a summary of all the events at this year’s Malaysia Chess Festival. All games will be played at the Cititel Midvalley ballroom:

a)Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open: Fide-titled event, nine rounds, Sep 1-13, USD4,000 first prize, entry fees range from USD50 to USD200 depending on player’s rating;

b)AmBank Malaysia chess challenge: Fide-rated event but player’s rating not to exceed 2200 points, nine rounds, Sep 1-13, RM2,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM75 to RM150 depending on player’s rating, 20 percent discount for players below 16 years old;

c)Merdeka national age group rapid open: seven rounds, Sep 5, medals as prizes, RM25 entry fee;

d)Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng international seniors open: Fide-rated event, nine rounds, Sep 1-13, RM4,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM100 to RM400 depending on player’s rating;

e)Merdeka individual rapid open: seven rounds, Aug 28, RM1,000 first prize, entry fees are RM30 (adults) and RM20 (under-16 players);

f)Astro Merdeka team rapid open: nine rounds, Aug 29-31, RM5,000 first prize, entry fees range from RM150 to RM375 depending on number of players in the team;

More details from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, fax 03.40244337, aham@pc.jaring.my or aham4you@gmail.com).

Penang rapid chess

The Penang Chess Association (PCA) is holding a rapid chess tournament on Aug 22 as a warm-up event for players before they participate in the Malaysia Chess Festival. Entry fees are RM10 for  PCA members and RM25 for non-members. To register, contact Tan Eng Seong (012-4299517 after 7pm, estan64@streamyx.com or estan64@gmail.com). Entries close on Aug 20.

UTP rapid chess

As part of Universiti Teknologi Petronas’ convocation programme this year, there will be a national rapid chess open tournament at the main hall of the university’s campus in Tronoh, Perak on Oct 9-10. The Malaysian Chess Federation and the Perak International Chess Association are the co-organisers with the University. Entry fees are RM35 for adults and players below 18 years old, RM30 for players below 16 years old and RM25 for players below 12 years old. More information available from Saeksarn Sinnaso (saeksarnskill@gmail.com) or Wan Fatin Izyan (eyanzdaqpe@gmail.com).