Dear Editor,
The Berbice Cricket Board (BCB), under the inspirational leadership of Hilbert Foster, has transformed itself to an organization admired not only in the Co-operative Republic, but the entire Carib-bean. The BCB not only manages the county’s administrative and cricketing programmes but engages in philanthropic community work in Rose Hall and throughout the county of Berbice. The sheer scope of the work undertaken by both Foster and the BCB is surely the res-ponsibility of politicians and community leaders.
The current level of leadership and organizational ability has never before been seen in the 81 year old history of the cricketing body. In addition to securing sponsorship and other contributions from businessmen Foster has courted assistance from cricketers, both current and past. Shimron Hetmeyer, Kevin Sinclair and Romario Shepherd are among the current and former players. Leslain Lambert heads the list of former players including Clayton Lambert, Jerry Angus, Kevin Darlington, Troy Halley, Narsingh Deonarine, Vishal Nagamoottoo and Mahendra Nagamootoo among others.
The initial donations commenced with Dr. Tulsi Singh and his brother Pooran, who is also a medical doctor based in Bar-bados. Businessman Brian Ramphal who is in California, Mc Sood Ahmad, insurance magnet and executive member of Cricket West Indies, who is based in St. Martin and a long list of businessmen and even a few organizations joined in the flood of contributors. With this level of endorsement pouring in, Foster used his talent and contacts to resuscitate sub boards and associations on the Upper Corentyne and West Berbice. He then arranged tournaments in all the areas in Berbice and with the assistance of sponsorship organized under 15 and under 20 competitions. He went so far as to promote Women’s Cricket.
I served as Secretary of the BCB in 1965 and with the support of the DCC representatives at the time, Fred Wills (now deceased) and Rex Mc Kay, advocated for Berbice to be given more votes in the parent body. At that time the entire Berbice was treated like a Club such as GCC, DCC, Maltenoes, et al. Mortimer George who served as secretary of the BCB for a number of years has written two books on the BCB highlighting the achievements of the Board and for producing outstanding cricketers like Rohan Kanhai, Basil Butcher, Joe Soloman, Roy Fredericks and Alvin Kalicharran. What is remarkable is that while the tournaments are going on the Board has been arranging training pro-grammes. No doubt Foster is a people’s person and is very sympathetic to the poor and unfortunate, he would, in instances hand out hampers.
The Medal of Service (MS) was bestowed on Foster by the coalition government. I think that the current administration should see it fit to elevate his award to Arrow of Achievement (AA) or a CCH (Cacique Crown of Honour). This will surely encourage him as well as other sports organizations.
Sincerely,
Oscar Ramjeet
