PSC boosts grassroots program

MANILA, Philippines — As it celebrated the agency’s 28th anniversary, the Philippine Sports Commission announced plans to further strengthen its grassroots program for the year in keeping with the administration’s thrust of reaching out to the countryside.

 “The mandate of PSC is very clear that we need to have grassroots program. We strengthened it by reviving EO 6364 to engage in partnership with LGUs. Through this we’re able to launch the Children’s Games and conduct a series of Coaches’ Education and we also included the Indigenous Games last year. The mantra of the Duterte administration is to make sports accessible to the periphery of the countryside,” Butch Ramirez said in a presscon yesterday.

For 2018, the agency has penciled 50 editions of the Children’s Games nationwide, 10 stagings of Indigenous Games, Smart ID program in all regions nationwide, more areas for Kabataan Iwas Droga (KID SOS), more LGU Consultative meetings to help them craft sports development plans, and nationwide sports open tournament for 15 years old and below beginning with the Visayas Open, among others.

At the same time, Ramirez assured the athletes and the national sports associations of the PSC’s continued support, earmarking P600 million to their training programs this year. However, Ramirez reiterated the need to make a thorough review on the policies on financial assistance and allowance schemes of athletes and coaches and make necessary revisions.

“We need to strengthen policies to avoid gaps and problems in funding the NSAs,” he said. “Before we release the individual financial allocations of the NSAs, we need a clear policy on which items will just be covered by the PSC, etc.”

He hinted the possibility of adjusting the allowances of the athletes and coaches in the PSC payroll, but stressed some in the 1,500-strong pool may have to be cut from the roster if they didn’t perform to expectations.

“We’re considering that (increase of allowance) but first we have to review,” he said.

“We only had 24 gold medals from the SEA Games, why maintain more than 900 (athletes)? We found out that of almost 1,000 athletes, those under the ‘priority athlete’ classification are only less than a hundred.  Then out of 600 coaches, there are only 60 ‘priority’. So we’re trying to review. Maybe the reason we’re not winning is we only have a few Top A ahletes, a few Top A coaches. So why retain so many in the training pool?” he said.

Reviewing the list and making a clear policy on which athlete and coach deserve allowances from the PSC, Ramirez reiterated, will rid the system of influence-peddling.

“We found out that some athletes are there because they’re related to this individual. By crafting policies, we can avoid that,” he said.