A year not to remember

Once again this column has to lament on another calendar year in Vincentian sporting activities, both on and off the field.

There was little to shout about, as commendable performances were few and far between, while there was more to get negative applause.

Can anyone single out a handful of efforts, for which St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) can rise and say congratulations at our achievements?

Save and except the performances of Sunil Ambris and Kesrick Williams in cricket; Linda Mc Dowall – athletics; Jason Doyle and Kai Bentick – squash; Alex Joachim – swimming, along with that of the senior men’s volleyball team, the Under-19 and senior male cricket teams, to list a few.

Otherwise, the pantry of success and acceptable levels of attainments was more or less bare.

But no one should really and truly always lay blame solely on our sportsmen and women, as they simply fell in line with what is served them from the top and trickles down to them.

First point of departure is that the Ministry of Education, National Reconciliation, Ecclesiastical Affairs and Information has a BIG misfit that has proven to be the stumbling block, in ensuring that the cradle of all sports in schools is well cared for and nurtured.

As a consequence, 2017 was just a year that the various disciplines had their competitions and winners were known.

The apathy of the assigned personnel was again reflected in the output of the SVG team at this year’s Windward Islands Schools’ Games, which were hosted here.

The woes of sports do not have their genesis with that ministry, as the other government functionaries have also been archaic in their thinking, and short on policies to fit into the modern era and demands of sports.

Therefore, the ministry with the responsibility for sports, in 2017 has been a lame duck, weary, unimaginative and low on substance.

So, for another year, the nation has been fed with meals of diatribe, empty promises and far-fetched ideas, which have left sports worse off than it was in 2016.

As it is, this sort of insignificance attributed to sports by the powers that be has left many of the willing and able coaches in their respective fields, players alike and some administrators, to see only hopelessness.

However, some of the persons who run the national associations must take some of the flack for what has been done to sports here in SVG for the past 12 months.

Conversely, they have to be called out for what has not been done, as they too seem listless and rudderless in their operations of sports.

These administrators have otherwise put personal enhancement of their status above that of the charges they were elected to serve.

They too have let personal and political party differences take precedence, to the detriment of those who are the most precious commodities – the athletes.

When lumped, it has put St Vincent and the Grenadines in a regressive state, with little cracks of hope to peep through.

The reality looms large that if something positive does not come, we can lose a generation of sportsmen and women, coaches, administrators, and other officials, who will take with them the few corporate entities which support sports with them into an abyss of indifference.

Hopefully, some can reflect and introspect that they are the root causes of the sad state of sports here; hence they will either shape up or ship out and make space for those with that sense of purpose for the greater good.

This discourse will be replayed at this time in 2018, if wholesale changes in policies, personnel, psyche and programmes are not made all round.