BIG BOOST: Hafiy receives the sponsorship from Hisham while Asmat (left) and Sarji look on.
KUCHING: The UMW Group has on Monday pledged a total of RM1 million to Professional Golf Malaysia.
The sponsorship started last year with a contribution of RM250,000 and this year, the group is contributing another RM250,000 towards the “PGM-UMW Glenmarie Classic”, which will be held from Nov 19-22 at the Glenmarie Golf & Country Club.
The balance of the cash contribution will be presented next year.
After the full disbursement of RM1 million, UMW will consider a further sum to support the tour.
The sponsorship comes as part of the UMW Group’s branding programme, as well as to support and promote the development of professional golf in Malaysia.
PGM Tour that was incorporated on Aug 5 two years ago is a non-profit organisation financed by donations and sponsorships from the corporate sector with the aim of promoting the development of professional golf in Malaysia.
Apart from the RM1 million pledge, UMW has also agreed to provide a RM20,000 sponsorship to Mohd Hafiy Afiq Suhaili – a student at the PGM Peak Performance Academy.
The academy provides training for the best male golfers in Malaysia to enable them to eventually play on the Asian and European Tours.
Currently, the programme has 12 students who are undergoing an intensive six-month programme.
Hafiy, who is pursuing a degree in Aeronautical Technology Engineering at University Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, started playing golf at the age of 12.
At the age of 15, he represented Kelantan in the Sukma Games.
In 2005, he became a member of Malaysian Golf Association (MGA)’s Elite National Squad.
After turning pro two years ago, Mohd Hafiy has produced gradual success making most of the half-way cuts in the 15 PGM events that he had participated.
As of today, Hafiy is in 22nd out of 94 players on the PGM Tour’s 2012 Order of Merit with earnings of RM24,814.60.
“This latest sponsorship is going to be a great help in my playing career on the PGM Tour. Before this sponsorship I was struggling a little bit because nowadays it costs quite a lot of money to keep on competing on the tour,” said Hafiy.
“I will try my best to do well on the Tour to prove that this sponsorship will not be in vain. Thank you UMW Group,” he added.
The cheques presentation ceremony was graced by the presence of PNB chairman Tun Ahmad Sarji Abdul Hamid who is also the Professional Golf of Malaysia chairman, UMW chairman Tan Sri Asmat Kamaludin, UMW president and Group CEO, Datuk Syed Hisham Syed Wazir and UMW executive director Dr Wafi Nazrin Abdul Hamid.