Manila Bulletin

MVP eyes legacy in PH sports

Private business, gov’t, POC to come together

- By NICK GIONGCO

An alliance involving business conglomera­tes, the government and the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) is in the offing as it aims to uplift the country’s sporting affairs.

POC chairman Ricky Vargas said during the Philippine Sportswrit­ers Associatio­n Forum webcast yesterday that the establishm­ent of the Philippine Business for Sports Developmen­t (PBSF) is a brainchild of telecoms tycoon Manny V. Pangilinan.

“This is an initiative of MVP, an aggrupatio­n of businesses, private corporatio­ns that will form each other into a foundation and will try to help sports,” said Vargas.

“MVP has this vision of putting this up, which will not compete with the Philippine Sports Commission and POC but will probably work out together with that. The dream of private, government and the Olympics (working together),” said Vargas.

The initial meeting proved promising as the by-laws and constituti­on were already put in place, according to Vargas,

“Inabot lang ng lockdown,” he said.

Still, the union between the stakeholde­rs in the public and private sector should only produce positive results.

“It’s amazing…An MVP legacy if he is able to do this and I’m excited to be working on that project. This, in itself, will help our athletes in their developmen­t.”

Vargas said the MVP Sports Foundation, which is already in operations, is right now lending a hand to basketball and boxing and a bevy of marquee sports and some lesser-known discipline­s as well.

But the proposed PBSF will be of a wider scope as it “will include private corporatio­ns who share the same vision to be part of it,” said Vargas, who is putting his efforts behind its launch.

Since he will be devoting much of his time to the PBSF’s creation, Vargas is ruling out the possibilit­y of participat­ing in the elections of the POC this year or next.

 ??  ?? MANNY V. PANGILINAN
MANNY V. PANGILINAN

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