Palarong Pambansa

The Palarong Pambansa is the premiere competition for high school and elementary athletes of the country.

This year, the event is hosted by Tarlac and it came as no surprise when I heard and read about many complaints on the facilities for the annual sports meet.

The event was held in Cebu in 1994, which led to the construction of the Cebu City Sports Center.

Many similar sports centers have been built around the country for the Palaro hosts and on paper, this is good because more people will have access to sports facilities.

Unfortunately, the sports centers in other places are not as well utilized as that of Cebu and yes, the millions of pesos used to build them have gone to waste.

The Palaro is a project of the Department of Education. A big bulk of the budget for the sports meet is used to build sports facilities or to repair the existing ones.

While the host of the Palaro is given several months to prepare, I am hoping to one day see that the hosts will have a longer time to put things together so that the glitches that are experienced will be minimized.

Instead of naming the next host, maybe the DepEd can name the next three hosts and work out a way for the early release of the funding.

The concept of the Palaro is very good. It allows athletes from the different regions to compete in one event where they can test their mettle against the best of the country.

The concept of having a different host every year is also very good as it allows more places to have a sports facility, but there has to be a plan how to put such structures to good use and develop more athletes.

More than having a plan to sustain sports development in the places where the new facilities would be built, there must also be a plan for the maintenance of the facilities so that they would not simply rot away.

The different places can learn from each other on how such sports facilities should be operated and also they can share notes on suppliers like for the rubberized track.

I am still looking forward to the day that the rubberized track of the CCSC would be repaired.

After 16 years, the track is already way past its lifespan. I heard that the funds are there, but then the best news would be when they would start working on replacing the rubberized track.

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MILESTONES: Happy birthday greetings go to Dr. Leopold Lucero, who is celebrating today.

The same goes to Geraldine Capacite-Consul, Mary Cecille Camus and Charla Pedrigal.

Advance greetings to my cousin Gaia Lebumfacil-Tan, who turns a year older tomorrow as well as to my long-time friend Zeus Cabigon.

More power to all of you!