PHILIPPINE Olympic Committee and Philippine Sports Commission officials met last Wednesday night to get the pedals circling for the country’s preparations for the 32nd Southeast Asian Games in Cambodia in May.
“It was a fellowship and working dinner meeting that delved more on the training of the SEA Games-bound athletes,” said POC President Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino, also the head of PhilCycling.
“There, too, were discussions on equipment that would be handed over to national sports associations and even local government units,” Tolentino added.
Issues on the late transmission of technical handbooks (THBs) on the 49 sports that Cambodia has programmed for the May 5 to 17 Games are hampering preparations that Tolentino described as “already late in the day.”
“The THBs were issued only days ago and most of them contain some errors, mistakes the host organizer has apologized for,” Tolentino said.
The Cambodia SEA Games Organizing Committee, or Camsoc, set a deadline for the entry by numbers last Saturday, but according to Tolentino, revisions had to be made on Team Philippines’ entry.
PSC Chairman Dickie Bachmann met with Tolentino for the second time since his appointment last December 28 and brought with him Commissioners Walter Torres and Olivia “Bong” Coo at the Conrad Hotel in Pasay City.
With Tolentino were POC auditor and Team Philippines chef de mission to Cambodia Chito Loyzaga, chairman Steve Hontiveros, secretary-general Atty. Edwin Gastanes, treasurer Cynthia Carrion-Norton and Athletes Commission head Nikko Huelgas.
The fellowship-cum-working dinner preceded a meeting late yesterday among members of Loyzaga’s team and the secretariat ahead of only the first Chef de Mission Meeting that Camsoc set for Jan. 24-25 in Phnom Penh, main hub of the Games.
Loyzaga had earlier stared at an 800-athlete Team Philippines and a total delegation of 1,200–counting the coaches, medical and administrative staff.
