THE Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) are looking at hosting the Asian Games — which Malaysia has never hosted before — in 2038 or beyond.
OCM vice president Datuk Shahrul Zaman Yahya said hosting the Asiad would logically be the next step for Malaysia after successfully hosting the Commonwealth Games and various Sea Games in the past.
Shahrul was appointed as chairman of the OCM multi-sport games committee last week.
"The purpose of this committee is to look at the possibility of hosting multi-sports games here," said Shahrul yesterday.
"To host a major multi-sport games, the preparation begins at least eight to 10 years before the event itself, a lot of times it's even longer than that.
"There is a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes.
"For us, we have already hosted the Commonwealth Games (1998), so in terms of natural progression the next for Malaysia should be the Asian Games.
"The Asian Games, in terms of participation, are also a much bigger competition than the Commonwealth Games.
"If you look at the Asian Games, the list of hosts have already been decided until 2034, so if we were to bid for it, it would have to be for 2038 or after that.
"This is something we are looking at, but we do have a very long way to go.
"We will have to speak to the OCM executive board, various other stakeholders and obviously the government."
By comparison, a total of 4,426 athletes competed at the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games while the number of athletes that competed at the 2018 Indonesia Asian Games was more than double at 11,300.
The confirmed hosts for the upcoming Asian Games are: 2022 (China), 2026 (Japan), 2030 (Qatar) and 2034 (Saudi Arabia).
Southeast Asian countries who have hosted the Asiad are the Philippines (1954), Thailand (1966, 1970, 1978, 1998) and Indonesia (1962, 2018).