Chin racial abuse condemned
June 20, 2012
Wexford's Lee Chin
Two Duffry Rovers players have been handed eight-week bans by the Wexford CCC after referee Brendan Martin highlighted racist comments directed at Lee in his match report from a recent SFC game against Chin's football club Sarsfields (he plays hurling with Faythe Harriers).
Chin, who is expected to start Wexford's Leinster SFC semi-final against Dublin on Sunday week and has been named at right half forward on the U21 hurling team to face Kilkenny tonight, is understood to be extremely upset by the incident, which Wexford chairman Diarmuid Devereux has condemned.
"Lee Chin is a Wexford man, born in Wexford, educated in Wexford, living and working in Wexford. He is one of our stars of the future. Hopefully many more will follow his lead and example," he said in today's Irish Examiner.
"Any form of racism in the GAA cannot be tolerated. It is terrible that Lee was subjected to these comments on a GAA pitch and the players involved should be ashamed of their behaviour. The hope I have is that through education and promotion of ethnic policy, we will rid Gaelic games of such abuse.
"The chances are that in the next 10 or 20 years, we will see the children of former non-nationals representing more and more counties."
Sarsfields chairman Ger Halligan is hoping to bring a motion to next year's Congress aimed at stamping out racial abuse.
He said: "We are in the process of working with other clubs to draft a motion to our county board and hopefully to Congress to deal with the issue of racism in the GAA and have something enshrined into the rulebook.
"We support Lee in this matter. As far as we are concerned the matter has been dealt with and the issue is closed. Lee has a couple of important games with the county U21 hurlers and senior footballers in the coming weeks and we wish him the best of luck." Tweet
