Dear Editor,
Congratulations to the Guyana CARIFTA Games Athletics team who returned home a few nights ago. This team, which is perhaps the most successful CARIFTA Games team to ever represent Guyana, returned without the expected fanfare. They won seven medals, two golds, three silvers and two bronze.
There was a fiasco at the Games in Jamaica, involving the Guyana team. Certain sections of the media reported that the team ran out of money to pay for food and Covid 19 tests. A member of the Guyana Delegation contacted distinguished Attorney-at-Law, Nigel Hughes, for assistance. Mr. Hughes, in his true altruistic manner, wired money to Jamaica to assist the athletes. For his magnanimous gesture he was accused of trying to score political points, unlike Mohamed’s Enterprise, whose monetary contribution was accepted without any questions asked. By the way, I hold no brief for this excellent Attorney-at-Law. I am not competent to do so.
The debacle started before the team left Guyana. Police athletes, Allyaha Headly (1500m and 3000m) and Osa Blair (100m and 4x100m relay), who trained hard under coach Lynden Wilson and achieved the qualifying times, were selected to participate in the Games. They were likely to medal. However their hopes were dashed, as the day before the departure of the team, they were informed that no money was available for them to make the trip, despite two weeks earlier, the police having written to the AAG informing them that if there were any difficulties for the police athletes to participate, the police were willing to assist. The police never received a response from the AAG.
As a former Sports Officer of the Guyana Police Force, I am certain that the Guyana Police Force would have made funds available for their athletes to participate in the Games. The police had done so before. I am sure that they would have done it again. Their present Top Cop, Clifton Hicken, is a sports enthusiast and would have easily find the money for his athletes to participate. The Police are not pernicious. Oswick Pellow and Simeon Adams, two other athletes who made the qualifying times and were selected to travel with the rest of the team to Jamaica, suffered the same faith as the distraught police athletes. It is time that the AAG get their act together and be proactive rather than reactive, or our athletes will continue to suffer due to the incompetence of their association.
Sincerely,
Clinton Conway
Former Sports Officer
Guyana Police Force
