Fourteen golfers from Australia are part of the Jack Akbar Shield 2024 golf tournament that tees off at the Fiji Golf Club today.

“The Jack Akbar Shield which has been played annually, it keeps growing every year, with a field of 64 anticipated this time,” Fiji Senior Golfers Association secretary Susan Yee said yesterday.

“All the past winners except for Jack Reddy will be participating this year. It will be interesting to see if one of the previous winners wins or a new winner walking away head high,” she said.

Yee added the competition would be a stroke event that would see the lowest net score, either a woman or a man will winner of the Jack Akbar Shield.

The Jack Akbar Shield started in 2015, in memory of the golf enthusiast, who passed away in Malaysia in 2014.

“This shield has become a much-anticipated annual event on the seniors’ calendar, since the demise of Mohammed

Razak Akbar, lovingly known as Jack Akbar to close friends,” Yee said.

Akbar was born in Extension St, Suva in 1929. He attended Marist Brothers Primary School and St Teresa Catholic School in Ba (when Suva schools were closed due to the war).

He then became an apprentice with the then Public Works Department (PWD) in Fitting and Machining. He later moved to Burns Philp (now Asco Motors), in charge of the machine shop. He founded Akbar Engineering Ltd in 1974.

Up until the early 1970s, he was a keen tennis player. During the formative years of Akbar Engineering, he was not able to spend time on sports. In the late 70s, he took up golf.

He used to be one of the first on the course, straight after his early morning prayers. Exercise was a key component of his struggle against diabetes which he contracted in his early 40s.

Social work was also a passion of Jack’s.

He served as president of the Suva Jaycees, president of Rotary Club Suva, vice president of Fiji Muslim League, chairman of Trustees for the Bayly Trust, chairman of the Tamavua Hospital Board of Governors, and member of the Diabetes Foundation. He also served as a Justice of Peace and was the honorary consul for the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.

His services were rewarded with an MBE by the Queen in 1987 .

Throughout all of his achievements, his partner in crime was his beloved wife Gulnoor Akbar, who used to keenly attend every Jack Akbar Shield prizegiving ceremony in Fiji.

Unfortunately, she passed away.

Previous winners of the Shield were: 2015 Thiphait Hussein, 2016 Gardiner Whiteside, 2017 Thiphait Hussein, 2018 Jack Reddy, 2019 Ishwar Nand, 2020 No tournament, 2021 No tournament held, 2022 Kevin McCarthy, 2023 Shalendra Prasad,

Meanwhile, champion Shalendra Prasad will be defending his title.

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