The merger of the Ministries of Education and Sport have been met with mixed reviews by heads of sporting associations.
Some have welcomed the coalescing while some believe that the Ministry of Sport is too important to be under the umbrella of the Education Ministry headed by Dr. Rupert Roopnaraine.
They opined that the all-important ministry should stand alone.
Peter Green (powerlifting and rugby)-“It may be a recipe for disaster. Sport is too big to fall under another ministry as funding may be diluted. Let us wait and see, I suspect it has to do with bureaucracy. I may be wrong but Dr. Roopnaraine does not have any seemingly avid interest in sport since I became involved in 2008 in powerlifting.
James Bond is far more grass root oriented. We will have to wait and see how things unfold.”
Keavon Bess (bodybuilding) -“I am not for the incorporation, it should have remained the way it was. However, let us see hope that they put different sections in place to deal with sports separately.”
Another association head who spoke on the condition of anonymity stated that: “The more ministries you pile on one person, the more complicated it gets. It not easy running one ministry much more two, to me it sets the stage for a lot of complications. Dr. Roopnaraine is a bright guy but there is only so much that he can handle.”
The association president added “Education is a large ministry and I think at the last budget most of the money was allocated to education. Education and sport are two large factors of your economy and with that in mind there should have been more or less a division where two ministers are tasked with the two jobs. It makes no sense to cut back on the cabinet and a whole sector may go astray.”
President of the Basketball federation, Nigel Hinds, president of the professional boxing board, Peter Abdool, president of the table tennis association, Godfrey Munroe and Head of the GFF Normalisation Committee, Clinton Urling were some individuals that supported the merger.
Urling issued the following statement yesterday:
I see no issues with the merging of the two portfolios. It will come down to how well the agency is organised and managed. Moreover, the synergy between the two Ministries makes it easier for the GFF to coordinate its grassroots, schools and youth programmes with the Ministry, since it greatly reduces the red tape in this regard.
We have already reached out to Mr. Roopnaraine on our plans to host the World Cup Qualifiers and he has been very responsive and accommodating thus far. Once he settles in, we would request more formal meetings to discuss our plans for the sport and how the GFF and government can work in partnership towards the sports growth and development.
