Minister of Culture Youth and Sport Dr, Frank Anthony Saturday night told the audience at the National Sports Commission (NSC) 2012 awards ceremony held at National Convention Centre, Liliendaal, that sports have tremendous value to the community and is seen as the glue that holds together the populace.
“Sports represent community pride and honour and that’s why the government would facilitate persons playing sports by spending over two hundred million dollars on community initiatives and grounds in the past few years, “he declared.
“We at the Ministry of the Sport, Youth and Culture would like to facilitate the development of sport and in partnership with the National Sports Commission and other sport shareholders will work to help further develop the sport holistically,” the minister added.
“Sports education has been lacking and we want our people to learn the best techniques in the world of sport so we urge all the associations to make use of the research center in Woolford Avenue that we are building so that they can understand the science of sport.”
The Minister challenged the NSC to set up a national database that would include all athletes and coaches from the various associations so that accreditation and monitoring of both athletes and coaches could be easily facilitated.
“We need to modernize as traditional methods will only get us so far and this center will help us to move into the 21st century of sports as we aim to provide a holistic approach to development and evolution so that we can be competitive on an international level,” stated the minister.
Director of Sport Neil Kumar in his address said: “It is our commitment to sport that we award individuals that have distinguished themselves from their peers through their exemplary showings throughout the year 2012 in their individual and respective disciplines and fields.”
“The Government has not faltered on its promise and promotion of sports because it is seen as an activity for development and success. Sport is a fundamental right of citizen and as such, the government has and will continue to support sport in its entirety,” he added.
Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport, Alfred King stated “Sports has a valued place in national development and is a major vehicle for evolution at an individual level while building cohesion and identity. Once seen as a tool of national advancement, sport should be considered a national culture as well as a viable economic and tourism investment.
“The recent fragmentation of certain sporting associations have clearly shown that if a collective, cohesive approach is not applied, then the individuals who are most affected are ones that matters most- the athletes, added King.
The successful awardees during the year 2012 were Shivnarine Chanderpaul (Cricket) and Nicolette Fernandes (Squash) male and female sports athletes of the year while Paul De Nobrega (Cycling) and Chelsea Edghill (Table Tennis) were the junior sportsman and woman respectively.
The runners up in the senior category were Dawn Mc Cammon Barker (Power lifting) and Winston Stoby (Power lifting) whilst the runner-up junior sportsman and woman of the year went to Gumendra Shewdas (Power lifting) and Priyanna Ramdhani (Badminton) and Mary-Fung-A-Fat (Squash).
Other awardees include: Outstanding Person with Disability award – Gibran Hussein Sarfraz (Table Tennis), Sports Team of the Year- (Guyana Junior Squash Team), Sports Coach of the Year – Carl Ince (Squash), Male and Female Sports Official of the Year- Peter Abdool (Boxing) and Stephanie Gomes-Fraser (Swimming) respectively, Sports Association of the Year (Guyana Amateur Power lifting Association), Most Improved Association of the Year (Guyana Squash Association), Sports Journalists of the Year- Orlando Charles(Photography), Avenash Ramzan(Non-Print) and Calvin Roberts(Print).
