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| Assistant Secretary, Division of Education Jomo Pitt |
The Tobago House of Assembly (THA) is not an ATM to fund activities of national sporting teams, Assistant Secretary in the Division of Education, Youth Affairs and Sport Assemblyman Jomo Pitt has said.
He said there has been a disturbing trend that has developed for national sporting organisations seeking financial assistance for national teams to participate in overseas tournaments. He said the Department of Sport recently received a request for financial assistance from the T&T Table Tennis Association for an under 15 national team which comprised 13 of the 19 players to participate in a tournament in Guyana.
He said over the past three months he has been receiving similar requests for financial assistance from national sporting bodies for national teams going abroad to participate in tournaments and there seem to be something fundamentally wrong about this.
Alluding to Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar's statement that T&T can no longer be an ATM for Caribbean countries seeking financial assistance, Pitt said it appeared that Tobago was the ATM for national teams going abroad once there were Tobagonians on the team.
He said he needed to collaborate with the Chief Secretary and members of the Executive Council in saying that the THA was not the ATM for national sporting organisations even if there were more players from Tobago on national teams.
"I don't know whether there is a feeling that once there were Tobagonians on a national team send the bill to the THA. This goes across for football, hockey, table tennis, lawn tennis and track and field," he told the sixth meeting of the Assembly's democratisation programme at the Glamorgan Community Centre on Thursday night.
Pitt assured that Tobago athletes will not be short-changed however if the national organisations cannot see about them.
He disclosed that in order to recognise the achievements of the island's youths, the Youth Department was planning to re-establish its youth awards programme to celebrate youths who would have contributed to the island, the country, the region and the world. Individual categories will include agriculture, entrepreneurship, leadership and academics while awards will be presented to groups with the most outstanding youth programmes.
Source: THA
I listen to Mr Pitt speak on many occasion when it comes to who get assistance from the Division of Education Youth Affairs and sport when it come to sporting activities. I am part of an organisation that host sport events in aid of developing the comunity individuals talent and lifestyle as well as cognitive development.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to who get assistance, its always certain groups (friends of them) that get's these assistance. this is very disturbing seeingthis happening when majority of those people they assist are only doing events for profitting and not really for development which comes down to reason of or the policies they have in place or shall i say the policies and procedures that dont exist when it comes to financial assistance.
It is wrong where national sporting teams ask asistance when there is the ministry of sport and sport company are there for those situations and better yet the sporting Association that are given funding for those purposes.
Everyday i see people who are not qualified in the fields of work in positons that cannot properly creaet and implement policies and procedures to proper develop and manage the division effectively for benefit of tobago
Young individuals like myself have sacrificed and go abroad to study to create a change for the betterment and development of the country and to get a job is hard which resorts us to going in the On The Job Training program where we are stigmatized as individuals as slaves and people who have no qualifications.
when will this stop with the hiring of friends and people who are qualified and have gained experienced given a chance .
New policies need to be in place for hiring human capital and proper contractual agreements are to be made.
respectfully