Horseracing hurt by racing holiday, rues Philracom

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine Racing Commission yesterday warned the horseowners group on the repercussions of its call for a “racing holiday” even as it dismissed the group’s claims blaming the decline in sales to the new Philracom leadership.

“They are barking at the wrong tree here. Take note that whole board took its oath of office only in Aug. 2011, yet they are attributing to us losses that were registered in 2010,” said Philracom chairman Angel Castano Jr. in clearing up the issues raised by the Marho, Philtobo and Klub Don Juan de Manila groups the other night.

On the contrary, Castano said they were able to check the decline when they took over. In fact, sales have already picked up in the first five months of the current year.

“The trend in the sales was really going down when we took over the Philracom. But we were able to mitigate the downtrend at the end of that year. In 2012, it was the horseowners themselves who requested, and we granted it, to trim the racing days from six to five days. It proved disastrous after two months, so we have to stop it in order to cut the losses,” he said.

On their boycott move, the Philracom chair asked the groups to spare the racing industry from such drastic actions since several sectors, which are largely dependent on the industry, will be severely affected by their move.

“There are so many major players (jockeys, grooms, OTB stations, racing clubs and their employees, and also their respective families) in the industry who are dependent on horseracing. Their (horseowners) ‘racing holiday’, which is tantamount to a strike, will surely cut their means of livelihood. Hindi maganda yan, ang industriya ang pinarurusahan nila. Why are they trying to hostage the industry and even mislead the President here?” he said.

Still, the Manila Jockey Club came out with a racing program yesterday although the horseowners group had said they would scratch out all their entries from the program.

Castano disclosed that the group’s complaint stemmed from the Philracom board’s decision to turn down their request to stop the deduction of the 3 percent trainers’ fund from the horse prizes of the owners.

“That fund is mandated by law way back in 1948 and we can’t abolish it just like that. Under the law, we are mandated to have that fund exist for the health, injury and retirement benefits of the horsetrainers,” said Castano.

“Since we know that the horseowners also have to deal with the high cost of maintaining horses, we offered them several options by which they can still contribute to the Trainers’ Fund. But they (horseowners) strongly opposed them and even gave us an ultimatum instead last May 31 for us to stop the said deduction or else they will be constrained to take drastic action,” said Castano.

He also wondered why the group didn’t question the deduction of 2-1/2 percent for the jockeys’ fund from the said horses’ prize, which has the same purpose like that of the trainers.