WILL PRESIDENT DUTERTE SUPPORT PHILIPPINE SPORTS?
By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Thu, 12 May 2016
This is the multi-million peso question often raised by sportsmen and sports fans about presumptive President Rodrigo Duterte.
"Sports is something that will build the muscle of the nation. Sports [instills] discipline. It?s part of growing a paradigm for young women or real men,? Duterte was quoted by Rappler.
?I-se-separate ko 'yan. Parang dati na Department of Education, Culture and Sports, pero I am inclined to create another authority. I want sports and sports only sa opisina na yun,? the lawyer mayor added.
It was also reported he was planning to create a Department of Sports. The last time it became a separate department was during the time of another strongman President Ferdinand Marcos when he created the Ministry of Youth and Sports Development.
Philippine Sports Commission Chairman Ritchie Garcia is positive Duterte will give due importance to sports development. ?I know that the good mayor will give sports its due,? said Garcia, an big bike enthusiast like Duterte, according to Philippine Star.
?We in the sporting world value the importance of the support Malaca?ang can give in building champion athletes,? added Garcia.
During the opening of Jr. NBA in Davao City, Sports Development Division-City Mayor?s Office (SDD-CMO) officer-in-charge William ?Butch? Ramirez, the former PSC chair, lauded Duterte's all-out support to sports development in his city as reported by Edge Davao.
?Mayor Duterte has always been an advocate of sports promotion and champion of the athletes,? Ramirez said. ?Through this program, the young athletes of Davao City will also be given the chance to display their skills before our national coaches.?
UP Mindanao is now the site of a 20-hectare area for the sports complex under the Davao City government?s management. ?The Sports Dome will help promote the development of sports and human kinetics as well as promote maximum image exposure and positive image for Davao City as a sports, tourism, business and investment mecca and zone of peaceful convergence,? said Mayor Duterte as quoted by Business World.
The sports complex called Sports Dome include the following facilities: 35,000-seater stadium, multi-purpose training gym, dormitory and medical building, low-rise commercial block, commercial block and recreation, parking building, power house and pump house, practice fields for football, tennis court, sports arena, archery and practical shooting range, indoor basketball, adventure sports, waste management and water treatment facility, aquatics center, and country club.
The P8 billion sports facility is designed to host national and international sporting events. A P300-million initial budget for the first phase of the sports complex has been approved and included in the General Appropriations Act for this year and construction had just started.
With all these facts and programs which he had done in Davao City, we can say that Philippine sports is in good hands with incoming President Rodrigo Duterte.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Maloney L. Samaco.
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