close
Thursday March 28, 2024

Fehmida urges provinces to invest in sports

By Our Correspondent
January 14, 2019

KARACHI: Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination (IPC) Dr Fehmida Mirza on Sunday urged the provinces to allocate big amounts for sports.

“After devolution, the responsibility now rests more on provinces than the federal government. They should allocate heavy budget for sports,” she said during the closing ceremony of the 12th Pakistan Premier Football League here on Sunday.

“I will urge the Executive Committee of the new Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) to leave the customs of the past and fill the grounds with the players. We have an abundance of talent but we have kept the players out of the grounds,” the minister said.

Hinting at the visit of Brazilian star Kaka and Portugal’s Luis Figo to Pakistan, Fehmida said that this reflected the trust in the current government. Later while talking to reporters, the minister clarified that there was no interference from the government in the working of any national federation.

“Federations are independent,” she said. “There is no role of the government in the working of federations. But if someone has been unable to deliver for 15 years in any sport while serving as its head he should think about it,” the minister said.

She said that the government was conducting audit of the federations. “The government is conducting audit of the federations and I think football federation will also be among them,” she said.

It is pertinent to mention here that PFF is not in the list of 14 federations whose forensic audit is being conducted. The reason is that the PFF has already disaffiliated itself from the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB).

Fehmida said that Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) had been given Rs500m during the last five years.“Are they not accountable! Accountability is absolutely necessary,” she added.She added that the federations should work for generating their own revenues.

About Pakistan Olympic Association’s (POA) decision to abolish the posts of its patron and patrons of the provincial associations, Fehmida said that she did not know about that decision. She, however, said there should be patrons.