Hail to our athletes!
It’s ASEAN frenzy once again. This early, I sincerely salute our athletes who remind us of our native Olympian ability to HURDLE rising prices, JUMP through pot-holes, RACE against time and traffic, GALLOP amidst crises and disappointments, SWIM through endless scandals and political bickering that clutter the airwaves, and DIVE into a bleak and unpredictable future.
There was a time when our athletes went to the Olympics or Asian Games with a strong chance of winning gold medals. That is now a distant memory. Today, we seem to settle for a hopedfor supremacy in the Southeast Asian Games or the SEA Games.
In terms of talent, physical build, enthusiasm, determination, and discipline, Filipino athletes are not inferior to those of our Asian neighbors. The problem lies in the quality of their preparation, financial support, and the choice of sports that the government and the public encourage.
Our Asian neighbors train their youth in sports where they can truly excel. Indonesia has become a world power in badminton. India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka are now dominant in cricket. Japan, Korea, and China have long been recognized in volleyball, badminton, martial arts, table tennis, swimming, gymnastics, and diving. Their victories in many Olympic Games have raised their youth’s sense of national identity, collective pride, and self-assertiveness.
In contrast, most Filipino youth remain stuck in an inferior and onesided sports development program that churns out athletes whose ultimate goal is to become clones of American basketball giants. So, while our highly-paid basketball stars and second-rate foreign imports are jumping and dribbling their way to the bank, our athletes in the other sports hop from one failed dream to another.
Also, while other ASEAN countries have set up monolithic sports bodies to supervise the training of their athletes, our national sports agencies are saddled with power struggle and political intrigues. Rather than being able to concentrate on their training, athletes are torn between divided loyalties.
Hope takes work. Let’s face it, the physical and mental preparation of our athletes are hardly commensurate with the hopes they cherish. Our Asian neighbors have long set up worldclass sporting infrastructures. Many of our training facilities, however, would have remained dilapidated, if not for this year’s hosting of the SEA Games.
Some sports depend only on private sponsorship in order to survive. The training of many athletes is financed by private schools where they study, their own parents, or private sponsors. Some grew up in the United States, trained there, and would later be invited to compete under the Philippine flag—at very little expense from our government.
I will cheer and pray for the victory of our athletes, but I hope my enthusiasm would not be dampened by the often dismal coverage by our local TV outlets that are given exclusive rights to air the SEA Games. Cable TV channels must also be allowed to broadcast the competitions. After all, they do this in an excellent way. Why deprive Filipinos of the right to watch the SEA Games events even through cable sports channels? And, why allow local TV outlets to assault our senses with limited and low-quality broadcast with endless advertisements?