Dear Editor,
First I must compliment the executives of the Guyana Amateur Basketball Federation after being elected in January 2014 with limited funds in their coffers and then working day and night to cross that hurdle to send the male and female team to the CBC Championship 2014 in Tortola, BVI. Kudos to the President, Mr Nigel Hinds, for his commitment.
Again the basketball fraternity wants to thank all sponsors especially Mr Paul and Patrick Haynes and those brothers and sisters in North America and Canada and the Guyana/BVI Association who helped provide an opportunity for Guyanese to get a scholarship to any college in the USA, as the CBC Championships is the tournament for such.
Some may say the time was too short for the teams to gel, but once teams include overseas-based players, some may have to get time off from their jobs and also make family arrangements before they can come to Guyana.
Since the inception of the Caricom Championships, Guyana has been up and down the ladder in terms of performance. A Guyana men’s team participated in the 2011 CBC games in the Bahamas with a 99% locally based Guyana team where we came in last. In 2014 we included 5 overseas-based players and moved to 5th place, so I see improvement.
I remember going to Suriname for the 2010 Inter Guiana Games, where our females brought a disappointing last and were embarrassed by our Director of Sports; the female team went and won in 2013 and was praised by the same person.
There were 3 females who helped Guyana win in Suriname in 2013 that were on the women’s team for the CBC in 2014. Also two males were in the CBC 2014 team that helped Guyana win the basketball segment of the IGG in 2007, with Guyana beating both French Guiana and Suriname.
I am a frequent patron of basketball and used to be an official for the National Schools Basketball Festival (NSBF) when it started. The Minister of Sport and Director of Sport made speeches during the NSBF and at no time let the children and parents know that Guyana is being represented at the highest level in the Caribbean by male and female teams at the 2014 CBC Championships.
So parents, there is always hope for your children to further their education with scholarships because Guyana has academically sound basketball players.
Guyana females had beaten Jamaica in the finals in 1996; 18 years later Jamaica females won the title in 2014. Teams can only get better once we keep competing against foreign teams in all disciplines, eg, look at our rugby team and our squash team.
All in all it was very costly to the GABF, not only on account of covering travel expenses but also because the overseas players stayed at the Wind Jammer Hotel, not the Gymnasium; they were given the GABF President’s SUV for transportation with driver and gas and whatever was asked for.
I totally agree, and the President feels the same way, that all teams representing their country must be given a per day stipend. The night before departure the team management had a small lime at the hotel, where the question was asked about a stipend, and it was said by the President that there is no stipend because we are all trying our best to send the female team.
I know it is hard for Andre De Florimonte to accept the decision to include Gordon Klaiber (who was incorrectly categorized by FIBA as a naturalized Guyanese) to fill the one spot FIBA allowed for naturalized Guyanese on the Guyana team, but when you look at the composition of our team, even Phil Jackson would go for Klaiber, eg our team already had at least three other persons who could play Andre’s position, although maybe not as well. But Klaiber was the tallest player on our team and could have played outside taking the other team’s big man outside.
If the National Sports Commission had given funds for a stipend these could have been provided to the players on the Guyana team.
On the matter of the uniforms we wait on the manager’s report to know if these were taken from his room and shared out to the players by someone else.
Yours faithfully,
Dennis Clarke
