THE 31st edition of the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games will be held on May 19 to 25, 2022, according to the Philippine Sports Commission.
In a Facebook post Sunday, Oct. 17, 2021, the commission said the Vietnam Southeast Asian Games Organizing Committee still has to give an official statement on this, however.
The information on the dates was obtained from some officials from Vietnam, who declined to be identified, after a meeting held by the Vietnam SEA Games Organizing Committee on the matter, the commission said.
The 31st SEA Games was originally scheduled to be held in Hanoi, Vietnam from November 21 to December 2, 2021.
But the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic prompted the Vietnam SEA Games organizing committee to postpone its staging to 2022.
The last host of the 11-country biennial games was the Philippines.
At the 30th SEA Games officially held from November 30 to December 11, 2019, the Philippines emerged overall champion with a haul of 149 gold medals, 117 silvers and 119 bronzes at the 56-sport event after fielding a whopping 1,115 athletes.
Postponed
Before the postponement of the 2021 games, majority of the SEA Games Federation members, including the Philippines, had voted against the postponement of the event.
Even Vietnam had initially been reluctant to postpone the Games because all its structures and venues were already complete, Philippine Olympic Committee president Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino said last June.
However,the rising number of Covid-19 cases in Vietnam led the host country to move for the postponement.
Athletes had already sacrificed their time and effort in training not only for the SEA Games, but also for the Asian Games, Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games and Winter Olympics in 2022, Tolentino said then.
In February, before the games were postponed, Tolentino said the Philippine team that would compete in the 31st SEA Games in Vietnam would be composed of 560 athletes. (CTL)