Malaysia finished with a haul of 26 gold, 17 silver and 29 bronze medals behind champions Indonesia (36-34-34), Iran (30-17-12) and Egypt (26-31-29) in the 58-nation championship for their greatest performance ever.
It surpassed their haul of 5-5-6 en route to finishing seventh at the inaugural Games in Saudi Arabia in 2005.
Youth and Sports Ministry secretary-general Datuk Jamil Salleh said that Malaysians should feel proud of the phenomenal achievement, which he attributed to the earnest commitment from athletes, sports associations, the ministry, National Sports Council (NSC), Olympic Council of Malaysia and National Sports Institute.
He said, however, that a post-mortem would be carried out to study the success as well as the weaknesses so as to ensure that the athletes will be in top form for the Myanmar SEA Games in December.
NSC director-general Datuk Seri Zolkples Embong said that the Palembang ISG was one of the best avenues for exposure for the athletes before the SEA Games.
He commended the badminton players, for doing better than their Indonesian counterparts by winning six of the seven gold medals up for grabs, and the swimmers for winning 12 golds – the highest contribution to the medal haul.
The performance of wushu exponents, he said, was also beyond expectation as they lifted four golds, six silvers and three bronzes although no targets were set for them.
The other gold medal winners included archery (three) and karate (one).
