The negatives and positives

Dec 27, 2008 Sports

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By Rawle Welch
Minister of Culture, Youth & Sport Dr. Frank Anthony in typical style gave another glowing review of his Ministry’s performance in 2008. However, there are a few things that seem to contradict the views of the Minister that should be highlighted so that readers can judge for themselves.
But first, I would like to start with the positives and the two that stand out immediately are the admirable progress the game of chess has made after a promise by the Minister last year to personally intervene in the sport’s revival and no one can deny that the game has made a strong resurgence after a lengthy hiatus from the national sports agenda, while his grievance about certain sports entities lack of performance is an accurate assessment that continues to concern him.
Dr. Anthony pledged that more rigorous efforts will be made next year to address the latter issue, while his announcement that attempts will be made to improve relations between the Ministry and those associations is another welcome step. He admitted that many associations were not performing at a desired level, but there were some that did well during the year, adding that the Ministry will have to look at the current legislation with the possibility of giving it more strength to tackle the ones that are lagging behind.
It is good that these observations were articulated by the relevant Minister which must be seen as confirming what a few sports writers have been complaining about all along.
For too long, the development of sports has taken a back seat to the personal ambitions of administrators causing a lot of heartbreak and shattered dreams of athletes, fans and parents among others.
While, the Ministry itself is not totally absolved from those sensitivities, the mere acknowledgement by the Minister gives credence to the annotations made by certain writers who’ve had to withstand numerous criticisms during their rightful pursuit to report on the lack of development in sport.
Even the Ministry has been found culpable at times of attempting to submerge the truth and hopefully with the Minister’s recent disclosure, it is envisaged that next year will see a new approach.
Negatives –
Let us now look at some of the negative developments and see if what the Minister reported should be taken lightly or ignored.
The Minister reported that infrastructural work was done at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall and the National Gymnasium where the lighting systems were improved.
That same set of news was reported in his 2007 year end review so was there duplication or was the work so badly done that it necessitated additional work less than one year after. There needs to be some form of clarification about this issue, while the Minister further disclosed that the National Park Tarmac was refurbished and lights installed and could now accommodate sports such as basketball, netball and lawn tennis. That is a welcome development, but how many of these disciplines are really taking advantage of the additional facilities. After one year, the Minister informed that work on the highly touted Olympic-size swimming pool has ceased due to the absence of piles which is required to strengthen the foundation for the intended structure. It was not catered for and more money is needed to procure such.
That is after telling the nation in his last year’s review that $40 million plus an additional $36 million from the supplementary budget was earmarked for the project and to now hear about piles being the hindrance to completing the first phase must be extremely disappointing to our young swimmers. It is hard to believe that was not catered for in the feasibility study which must have been done prior to the start of the project, especially when one considers how near the Atlantic Ocean the construction is being done.
Next is the tennis centre at Non Pariel on Woolford Avenue and one wonders how long will it take to be concluded now that the rain is falling incessantly.
One year ago, we were told that the surfaces will be completed within a month or two and twelve months later its use is yet to become a reality.
The National Sports Policy is much closer after one year and one would only hope that after such extensive deliberations a comprehensive document will emanate from the Ministry. The Minister also spoke of the creation of sports councils that could assist the Ministry in decentralizing sports and making it more accessible in the outlying regions.
It would therefore be interesting to know whether that was done and what is the current state of that initiative.
More could be said, but we’ll continue to monitor further pronouncements.

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