Rectification to the previous entry:
It came to some people’s attention that although there has not been an announcement on the HKCF site, another website, www.hkjuniorchess.org of Hong Kong Junior Chess Club (HKJCC), is open for registration of HK Junior Chess Championship 2014. The website uses its own logo and it does not mention HKCF.
When it comes to representing Hong Kong in FIDE tournaments based on the event, we note that there is a difference in the notes of 2014 flyer issued by HKJCC with the flyers of previous years issued by HKCF and HKJCC as below:
2014: “The HK Juniors Chess Club would support all winners to represent HK in the corresponding junior international events……”
2013: “All winners may have the priority to represent HK in the corresponding junior international events…….”
We asked Jackson Li, President of HKCF some questions, to please:
– 1: clarify the relevance, if any, of these differences for the players
– 2: explain what the relationship is between HKCF and HKJCC
– 3: in that context, confirm that HKCF is the only organisation which can nominate both junior and adult players to represent HK in the FIDE tournaments organised by FIDE and the Federations of other countries
In response we learned that historically the HKJCC Championship was founded by Ms. Ho and only later run under the HKCF support. This year Ms. Ho decided to go on her own and that’s why that event no longer has HKCF endorsement.
Answers to the concrete questions were as follows:
-1: Previously, winners had priority to represent HK and now not.
-2: The relationship between HKCF and HKJCC is just like HKCF and Caissa; while HKCF respects the efforts of various clubs in promoting chess, HKCF do not have any preferential terms over one and another.
-3: HKCF is still the only organisation that can nominate both Junior and adult players for FIDE events.
We are making a fuzz out of this because:
1) there is a strong impression among public that this is an official qualifying tournament – which it is not, it is not even endorsed by HKCF;
Information on Ms. Ho’s website gives the idea there is an official status to HKJCC tournaments
2) because of this impression some events had been cancelled, like the HK-Macao Interport because of the wrong reasons – trying not to clash calendars. In that sense the late notice of all HKJCC organized tournaments is disturbing – but now less so as these tournaments are not any more official than e.g., the upcoming Quarry Bay School Junior Star (9 Nov) event, the Active Kids Novice (16 Nov) tournament or Caissa Rapid and Blitz tournaments (29 Nov and 7 Dec).
3) Ms. Ho is the HKCF Juniors coordinator and we find this set-up a serious breach around managing conflict of interests.
Whereas in our previous entry we recommended U13 and U17 to join the HKJCC tournament we take back this recommendation and invite players of that age group to freely choose between HKJCC or DB Rapid on 29 November as both are not officially FIDE qualifying events without any official status, however, the DB rapid is a Youth Grand Prix qualifing tournament for U14 to get a fully sponsored trip to a prestigious international tournament. Don’t miss it out!
