SPORTS EXCELLENCE AS PART OF THE STATE OF THE CITY ADDRESS
By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Thu, 21 Mar 2013
Yours truly delivered my Sate of the City Address before the City Coucil last Monday, March 18 at the Maasin City Gym witnessed by some 3,000 Maasinhons including Congressman Roger Mercado. It was a 55 minute talk and was applauded 90 times as counted by the media. One of the favorite topic in the said address was about Sports Excellence. Here are the excerpts:
SPORTS EXCELLENCE
Maasin City became the host of the 2013 National Boxing Championships, the first time Region 8 hosted such a prestigious national sporting event. According to Executive Director Ed Picson, it was the best organized national championships in the history of ABAP. It placed Maasin in the sporting map of the country with national media coverage. Maasin City boxers won 1 gold medal courtesy of Ruby Nicanor, who will now be included in the women's national training pool in Baguio City, 3 silver medals by Daryl Ramos, Richard Bacala, and Michael Kaibigan, and a bronze medal by Jason Entia. Maasin City placed sixth overall in the entire Philippines behind Davao del Norte, Bago City, Misamis Oriental, General Santos City, and Mandaue City. And we are number one in the Eastern Visayas Region.
We have produced two professional boxers who are national champions: the late Alex Aroy of Maria Clara, Philippine Boxing Federation (PBF) light-flyweight champion, and Adonis Aguelo of Matin-aw, PBF super bantamweight and PBF featherweight champion. Jason Pagara of Lib-og is now World Boxing Organization international welterweight champion and brother Albert Pagara is now rated number three contender in the Orient Pacific Boxing Federation featherweight division.
Every month we are the recipient of the Summit Amateur Boxing Fight Night program granted by ALA Gym, the only other recipients being Cebu, Dumaguete and Tagbilaran. Soon we will be having the Cobra-ALA professional fights every month. That's how popular Maasin is in the field of boxing.
We have produced two Palarong Pambansa gold medalists in swimming. Edison Pacsa won a gold in the 50 meter breaststroke in Puerto Princesa in 2008. Christian Salud won the gold of the same event in Lingayen, Pangasinan in 2012.
Mary Joy Calapre and Angelica Baluran won the gold medal in lawn tennis in the National Batang Pinoy in Naga City in 2011. They could have easily won again in Iloilo City last year but their trip was aborted by the typhoon.
For the first time, we have hosted the 2013 Regional Paralympics for athletes with disabilities. It was the first time Maasin City participated in such an event for differently abled athletes. But Maasin got the overall championship besting other cities and provinces in the region.
We have invited PBA legends Alvin Patrimonio, Johnny Abarrientos, Bonel Balingit, Vince Hizon, Nelson Asaytono, Bong Hawkins and other former PBA superstars to play in Maasin.
The Maasin City Gymnasium is undergoing additional construction. We have hosted EVRAA 2012 and is planning to co-host EVRAA again in 2015 with the Province as the main host.
We were awarded the Urban Health Champion in 2010 by the World Health Organization through our Healthy Lifestyle Program. We are recognized as part of the 1000 Cities 1000 Lives of the WHO. We have conducted fun runs, hataw exercises and other healthy lifestyle activities.
We are the only mayor sportswriter in the country today. We are writing for philboxing.com, an internationally known boxing website. Our co-writers are Manny Pacquiao, Gerry Penalosa, Ronnie Nathanielsz, Recah Trinidad, Sev Sarmienta, Manny Pinol, Salven Lagumbay, among others. We are the newly inducted member of the very popular Sports Communicators Organization of the Philippines (SCOOP). And we were recognized by a panel of Filipino NBA sportswriters now based in the United States, led by Homer Sayson, whose grandfather hails from Dongon.
My detractors say the mayor is concentrating on Sports. They are correct because I consider Sports as a venue for youth empowerment, sports for tourism promotion, sports for economic development, sports for anti-drug campaign, sports for livelihood, sports for healthy lifestyle, sports as a complement for education, and sports for overall barangay development because of the gymnasiums. And when they say the mayor is concentrating "only" in sports, they are terribly wrong.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Maloney L. Samaco.
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