POA urges govt to understand gravity of situation
By Abdul Mohi Shah
ISLAMABAD: As the time is running out for Pakistan to prepare squads for the forthcoming 13th South Asian Games and write a guarantee letter to host the next edition, Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) President Lt Gen (r) Arif Hasan has reminded the government on the gravity of situation.
In a letter addressed to Dr Fehmida Mirza, Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination, the POA president stressed the need to convene an urgent meeting of the officials of government and Olympic body to settle the pertaining matters on a priority basis.
The POA president feared that any further delay would leave irreparable impact on the Pakistan teams’ performance in the 13th edition.
“When the teams of all other South Asian countries have already started training and preparations for the Games to be held in Nepal in December, the government here has yet to give a go-ahead to start the camp training. Any further delay would mean poor to low performance by the teams in different disciplines.”
The POA president also reminded the government of issuing the guarantee letter to host the next edition of the Games which is due in Pakistan.
In the letter, the POA president said since the dates of the 13th edition of the Games has already been finalised there was a dire need to start the preparation at the earliest.
“We have already conveyed about the SA Games dates to the Pakistan Sports Board. Pakistan has participated in all the editions of the Games. You will notice that our performance has been commensurate to the input in terms of resources for all aspects of training. Our performance was good in the 4th, 9th and 10th SAF Games due to the extraordinary measures taken. However, whenever there was neglect and shortcomings in our preparations the results have been embarrassing.
“Of special note would be the 8th SAF Games, where we were placed 4th (after even Nepal), the 11th SAF Games where we barely managed to remain ahead of Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and the 12th edition where we were behind Sri Lanka. Our preparations for the upcoming Games should have started a long time back.
“If we don’t start now the results, I assure you, would be disastrous. The non-allocation of grants to the federations has further aggravated the situation. With the present state we are likely to be behind India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal who have been training for the last year or so. That would leave us ahead of only Maldives and Bhutan,” the letter says.
The letter mentioned that there is a need to finalise a plan covering following necessary aspects for the 13th South Asian Games 2019 including allocation of budget, strength of contingent in accordance with sports disciplines of the games, training camps and ancillary arrangements for foreign training, details of sports equipment required.
“The South Asian Games are rotated in an alphabetical order and held after every two years. Therefore after Nepal it would be our turn. In case we are interested in holding the next Games (which I strongly recommend that we should be), we have to give them a government guarantee of support in all aspects. This assurance has to be given by us in the next meeting to be scheduled soon.”
The POA president also feared that in case the written guarantee as contained in the constitution of South Asia Olympic Council is not provided to the South Asian Olympic Council secretariat, the Games would be allotted to the next country — Sri Lanka.
“Sri Lanka and Bangladesh have already expressed their willingness and interest to hold these Games. In view of the urgency of the above two issues, may I request you to call a meeting to discuss and decide these urgent matters.
“If not inconvenient to you, may I take the liberty of inviting you to the POA meeting here at Lahore? It would be an honour and a pleasure for us to host you. It would also give you an opportunity to meet all the stakeholders and discuss sports with them,” the letter says.