Changes to Maldives Sports Award, AI used to select winners

Maldives Ministry of Sports, Fitness and Recreation has decided to make changes to its annual sports awards scheduled for July 27 and incorporate Artificial Intelligence (AI) into the winner selection process.

This was announced during a press conference held by the panel of judges who selected the winners this year.

"We used artificial intelligence a lot for our work this time, especially in ranking competitions, ranking sports, and in determining the level of achievements and from which competitions they were achieved," said former basketball player Abdul Naafiu Thaufeeq (Thabbe), a member of this year's judges panel.

They added that the panel used reports from "Strides of Success" to rank local sports associations and determine which association performed the best.

Judges also stated that all associations were requested to submit detailed reports of their work to the "Strides of Success" platform and highlighted the significant support received from the associations.

"This information is otherwise difficult to obtain. Most of the time we used to get this input via a document submitted to the commissioner of sports after holding an AGM," Naafiu said, highlighting the progress made in maintaining association documents.

"However, with this new change, we're able to notify associations of the data they are required to submit [to be eligible for this award]," he said.

Judges also addressed certain changes brought to the names of awards, such as the previous title of 'photographer of the year' which has now been changed to 'visual artist of the year. The committee clarified that this change was decided upon after consulting with the sports councilor, in order to allow videographers and other content creators which promote sports through other means of art.

However, the awards will continue the trend of previous years and will not include beach volleyball and futsal, as both sports do not have a national league.

The press conference held yesterday at Henveiru Boalhage was attended by all five judges on the awards panel. They include former FIFA referee Ali Saleem, football match commissioner Ahmed Shaahir, former secretary general of table tennis association Ismail Sujau and sports council member Aminath Shaashida (Naash).