FIBA Asia executive director Hagop Khajirian said any changes with regards to eligibility issues like the one affecting the Philippines will have to be made with a careful approach.

Khajirian made this remark when asked specifically by former PBA commissioner Noli Eala about FIBA’s requirement of having to secure a passport before the age of 16 on the latter’s program Power and Play.

“We are open for change of rules if the proposals or the logic of the presented proposals can help develop basketball worldwide. Considering the naturalized players, we always and everybody has to take into consideration to keep the balance between naturalized players and the local players,” Khajirian said in Eala’s program that aired Saturday, June 5.

The passport requirement, known in local basketball parlance as the “Hagop Rule” that prompted a hearty laugh from Khajirian, has prevented Fil-foreign players from suiting up as locals in FIBA competitions.

Players like Stanley Pringle, Christian Standhardinger and Mo Tautuaa are only required to suit up as naturalized players after they failed to secure a Philippine passport before turning 16.

The most prominent case is the Utah Jazz super sub Jordan Clarkson, who is still considered by FIBA as a naturalized player despite claims by the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas that the NBA Sixth of the Year already had a Philippine passport at the age of 12.

But Khajirian explained that there are some key factors that need to be taken into consideration before there can be changes in FIBA’s eligibility.

“The main purpose is to develop basketball in the country, to develop local players in each country. The others who join aspiring or getting their nationality must not be adopted for good or else we will never develop basketball in any country, I’m not talking about the Philippines,” he said.

“So even if there are proposals to study the case and the possibility of increasing the number of naturalized players in any national team, we have to take it into consideration (if) this change will develop basketball worldwide, (if) this change will help improve basketball on a national level. So these are our concerns, not individual cases that you can do this or that.

“I am sure that even in the Philippines, when you are ready to make any changes within your local rules, we take into consideration what is good for basketball in the Philippines. It's the same approach you will see in FIBA,” added Khajirian.