By Tamica Garnett
DIRECTOR of Sport, Christopher Jones, has said that the National Sports Commission (NSC) is still awaiting data from several sport Associations/Federations, even as he remains hopeful that the initiative could be completed by October month end.According to Jones,information has already been inputted into the system, but while information has been forthcoming from some sporting fraternities it has not been easy with others.
There are a few disciplines that have this information at the click of a finger.However, there are others that we’re still collecting data from.” Jones shared with Chronicle Sport.
This new deadline comes after it was previously hoped that the initiative would have been completed by the end of last month, August.
. The athletes’ database is a long-awaited project that is expected to complement things like the even longer awaited National Sports Policy. The NSP is a document that had previously been promised by the People’s Progressive Party, Civic (PPP/C) from as long back as 2008.
Speaking on the athletes database, Jones describes the realisation of this initiative as ‘ground breaking”.
“We’ve never had one. That in itself is ground breaking, there is no data that one could go to a computer, click a name and that persons profile comes up and his or her achievements over the years comes up. There is nowhere [in Guyana] where that is had, so this is ground breaking.”
During the reign of the PPP/C administration,former Minister of Sports, Dr. Frank Anthony, back in 2010, had hinted at the setting up of such a facility, but he too spoke of coming up against a brick wall in sourcing information from sporting bodies.

Jones, for his part, had first began to speak of his aim to set up the facility last year, sometime after he was first selected to run the NSC, when the APNU/AFC government took over. Jones, back then, noted the great tool that the database will be,saying that, “The essential idea behind the database is to pool all our national athletes into one database of which the National Sport Commission will keep a tab on those activities and their progress in whatever region they exist.”
He pointed out that the database will greatly assist athletes from far flung areas in Guyana who are rarely seen at prominent local events,save for once or twice a year, and often times never heard of again.
The database would rectify this anomaly by helping the NSC to keep track of the athletes and ensure that they are afforded the same opportunities that those in central locations are given.
Primarily, athletes entered into this database will be tracked and trained with the 2020 summer Olympics in mind, according to Jones. The database is also expected to see preferential medical treatment for athletes, and facilitate in the awarding of scholarships to athletes.
The NSC has already done consultations with E-governance towards the setting up of the database. According to Jones, the NSC will be looking to make some of the information open to the public, with the hope of having an independent website set up for the NSC, where persons can go and easily access information on Guyana’s athletes across a wide number of sporting disciplines.