Sports for peace, development

The Philippine Sportswriters Association (PSA) selected eight sports personalities as its 2006 Athletes of the Year. The award night, which is supported by San Miguel Corp., will be held on Jan. 18 at the Mall of Asia. The awardees are: professional boxing‘s Manny Pacquiao; pool superstars Efren "Bata" Reyes and Ronnie Alcano; bowling’s Biboy Rivera and Doha Asian Games gold medalists Joan Tipon and Violito Payla of amateur boxing; Antonio Gabica of billiards and wushu’s Rene Catalan.

By choosing eight sports personalities instead of one individual as Athletes of the Year, the PSA, headed by Malaya’s Jimmy Cantor, broke tradition once again. Last year, the 58-year-old association of sports journalists gave the athlete of the year award to Team Philippines for the country’s first ever overall championship in the 2005 Southeast Asian Games.

While all of this year’s awardees undoubtedly deserve the commendation to be given by the PSA, it might be wise for the PSA leadership to consider opening up other categories and recognizing individuals or entities that excel in or promote other aspects of sports and physical fitness. In fact, while reviewing the award categories it might be good to have the PSA do more basic things like taking another look at its mandate and formulating its own vision-mission statement. Such a review will allow the PSA to take a fresh look at its fundamental objectives and directions and hopefully produce some new and innovative ideas that respond to emerging dimensions of sports.

Such dimensions include the importance of establishing a close linkage between mass based and elite sports thus encouraging participation and life long commitment to sports and recreation, the emergence of sports as a tool and integral part of overall national development and the tie up between sports and other sectors such as tourism, local government, health, education and the environment.

Recognizing the role of sports in peace building and, for instance, promoting gender equity is, in my mind, one valuable contribution that the PSA can make. Highlighting what individuals and groups do to promote social justice in sports by including the excluded and the least advantaged, thus making sports truly for all, are examples of how PSA can support overall national goals and the adoption of an egalitarian approach to sports and physical fitness.

For starters, I can suggest that schools or colleges that have innovative physical education programs or creative approaches to teaching physical education, be recognized for such efforts. It must be remembered that a strong physical education program is an essential component not just for building up a core of outstanding elite athletes but also for encouraging life long commitment to sports. A strong PE program ultimately helps reduce the national health bill and is an avenue for value formation.

A local government’s commitment to mass based sports and how it implements such a commitment through a well-thought out program is, for example, worth recognizing.

Groups or competitions that demonstrate in a concrete way the use of sports for peace and development in a consistent manner could also be given some form of tribute. We sure can use this kind of award considering the number of never ending conflicts in the sports community that, ironically, involve sports officials themselves.

Some ideas from other parts of the world have emerged recently on the role that sports plays in fostering peace and development. Augustine Yao Dzathor initiator-manager of the Africa University International Peace Marathon presented some ideas in his paper on Sports for Peace and Development that he presented in December 2003 in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania.

In his paper, Dzathor states that while cats do play, dogs also play and even animals in the wild play, hardly hurting their own kind, the human race is however the only species that is known to have deliberately or accidentally invented sports as part of culture rather than nature. It is not really known when humankind started to invent sports. The most famous association and religious sports, the Olympic Games, date as far back as 776 BC although it may have been in existence long before then.

Sports have always been part of man. Dzathor states that the early occupation of man seems to be the genesis of all modern sports. Hunting of animals and gathering of wild fruits, roots and herbs involved application of motor and psychomotor skills such as running, jumping, throwing, bending, lifting, digging, pulling and coordinating physical and mental functions. These appear to be the basis of most, if not all contemporary sports.

Ours is a troubled world and peace is nowhere to be found in many parts of the world. Peace is needed for development (and development enhances peace) for as Dzathor states development requires certain facilitating environments to take place or to be speeded up. Chief among these are the presence of skilled human capital and peace. Even for the most advanced countries, war can reduce to rubble in the wink of an eye, all that has been painstakingly built over hundreds of years.

Sports is therefore being used to bring individuals and groups from different races, social classes, religions, nationalities and ethnic backgrounds together to interact at sports festivals. During such competitions, athletes get acquainted with each other to promote peace and harmony. Athletes, officials and spectators from different cultural backgrounds commingle and tend to learn more about each other’s culture and values during sports festivities. This interaction results in attitudinal change that ultimately positively affects social behavior.

There is really nothing magical with the link between sports and other human endeavors. As Dzathor states, when all is said and done, one neither needs Solomon’s wisdom nor the ingenuity of Einstein to realize that sports can be a very potent and effective mechanism for promoting peace and development, if well harnessed.