KUALA LUMPUR: Former Youth and Sports Minister Khairy Jamaluddin believes that Azizulhasni Awang could have been given a warning instead of being disqualified from the men's keirin at the Paris Olympics yesterday.
Khairy pointed out that the 2016 Rio Olympics keirin final should have served as a precedent when commissaires dealt with the incident involving Azizulhasni.
Azizulhasni, drawn sixth behind the derny, was judged to have overtaken the derny before it left the track during his first round heat at the Saint Quentin en Yvelines Velodrome yesterday.
Khairy said Jason Kenny (Great Britain), Azizulhasni and Joachim Eilers (Germany) were let off with a warning after all three committed the same offence in 2016 and the race was restarted twice.
"During the men's keirin final in Rio (2016), there were two false starts," said Khairy on Instagram today.
"The first involved Kenny and our Azizulhasni. The second involved Eilers. All three were judged to have overtaken the derny.
"I remember because I was in the pit of the velodrome with team manager (Datuk) Amarjit Singh and coach John Beasley.
"All three countries appealed against disqualification.
"I remember telling Amarjit, 'we are lucky Azizul isn't the only one who overtook the derny and that a British and German were also judged to have done the same. The judges will not dare to disqualify the Western cyclists.
"Sure enough, all were given a warning but were allowed to start the (restarted) final. Kenny took gold and Azizul won bronze.
"What happened tonight (yesterday) was a mistake but there was a clear precedent that a warning could have been given instead of outright disqualification."
Chef de mission Datuk Hamidin Amin confirmed that Malaysia filed an appeal following Azizulhasni's disqualification but were unable to overturn the decision.
On a positive note, Azizulhasni's teammate Shah Firdaus Sahrom kept Malaysian medal hopes alive by winning his first round repechage yesterday to secure his spot in today's quarterfinals.