A problem like Mary Joy Tabal
ASTORM is brewing around the recent feat of the country's marathon queen, Cebu's own Mary Joy Tabal. She broke the Olympic qualifying time of 2 hours, 45 minutes by clocking 2 hours, 43 minutes and 31 seconds in the Scotiabank Ottawa Marathon in Canada. Ideally, that would have been enough for her to join the Philippine delegation to the Olympics to be hosted by Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in August.
But Tabal may not realize her dream of joining the Rio Olympics if Philip Ella Juico, president of the Philippine Amateur Track and Field Association (Patafa) will have his way. Juico is now lobbying with the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) to deny Tabal's entry to the Olympics if she does not kowtow to the Patafa demand that she seek reinstatement as national team member.
Tabal used to be a member of the national team but quit due to differences with Patafa on her training program and sponsorship projects.
Earlier reports said that the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC), which provides funding for the training of national athletes, and the Philippine Olympic Com- mittee (POC), the mother organization of all National Sports Associations (NSA) in the country, are amenable to Tabal joining the country's Rio delegation. This position does not sit well with Juico.
“You'll be rewarding disrespect, disobedience and insubordination,” said Juico in an mb.com.ph report. “We are following Olympic standards as well as values and respect for authority and rule of law.”
While Juico has insisted that Tabal cannot qualify for the Rio Olympics if she does not have an endorsement from Patafa to the IAAF, a POC official, Romeo Magat, said in a spin.ph report that if the POC endorses an athlete, the NSA (in this case Patafa) is no longer needed. But POC President Jose Cojuangco Jr. is beginning to mellow on his initial support for Tabal. He now says that the NSA needs to be factored in when POC decides on Tabal's status.
PSC chairman Richie Garcia has a good point on the issue. “In the Olympics, the first priority is the country, not the National Sports Association,” he said in a tribune. net.ph report. But will Juico and the other sports officials whose egos were torched by Tabal's feat understand that?