FOR too long our sports administrators/organisers have been showing scant respect for the media when it comes to time for press conferences and the start of sporting activities, and these issues need to be addressed with urgency.
On numerous occasions, too many to remember, the media have been invited to cover press conferences/briefings and sporting activities.
When the invitation reaches the media houses, it particularly states the time the activity is set to start, but lo and behold, when the media arrive on time, we are asked to hold on for a few minutes more “because some official or the other has not arrived as yet”.
This practice by our sports administrators/organisers has been going on for the past three decades or thereabout.
These pressers/sporting events never get under way until 30 to 45 minutes after the time stipulated by the sports administrators/organisers.
This to my mind is total disrespect for the media who have other sport-associated events to cover.
I am of the firm belief that local sports administrators/organisers have no respect for the media or time and according to the old book: `Time is Money.’
This attitude by our administrators rubs off on our sportsmen and women, since it is an infectious kind of thing and if not treated, will continue to spread.
Only last Thursday, the media was invited to cover a press conference for a Pro/Am boxing card that is fixed for the Ancient County of Berbice on March 20 at the Rose Hall Community Centre ground.
The presser was scheduled to get under way at 12:00 h and the four local print media houses were on time.
At 10 minutes past the scheduled start, we were asked to hold on for another five minutes.
However, 35 minutes after the scheduled start, the co-organiser of the card, Orlan Rogers, did not arrive, but Eion Jardine, a Guyana Boxing Board of Control referee and supposedly the match-maker of the three professional fights that were to be complemented by eight amateur fights, arrived and was told that this sort of behaviour pattern by our sports administrators/organisers must cease, but minutes before his arrival, members of the media houses present had already decided that enough was enough and we would stage a boycott of the event which we think we rightly did.
Mind you, Jardine made it clear that the fact that the promoter/organisers of the card were absent was no fault of his.
This type of behaviour by Rogers is not an isolated case, as the same type of behaviour obtains for many, many, many other sporting associations and this has been going on for too long.
Only Thursday, the Guyana Rugby Football Union invited the media to a 13:00 h press conference, but it did not start until 20 minutes past the scheduled time.
I can go on and on with other such cases by other sporting associations/organisers, but will refrain for now.
There needs to be a stop to this infectious situation in local sports if Guyana is to improve its image with regard to consideration for other people’s time.
We, the members of the media, need to `Draw the Line’ and demand respect from those in authority or we ourselves will become infected with the dangerous disease.
I know some sporting associations will want to counter by saying many times the media is late for assignments. But I want to make it quite clear that this particular journalist is most times on time for assignments. The same can be said for most of the other media houses.
What I am saying is, if a press conference or sporting activity is scheduled to start at a particular time, then `let’s get it on’ regardless of who is absent.
Only this way would we be able to drill some sort of discipline into those individuals who are guilty of being continuously undisciplined.
I personally think that sports administrators/organisers should take a leaf out of national cycle coach Hassan Mohamed’s book.
Any cyclist will tell you, when Mohamed sets a time for the start of anything he organises, you bet your bottom dollar, it starts ON time and this is why cyclists, the country over, turn up at least 15 minutes before a race is scheduled to start, once it is organised by Mohamed.
Come on clubs, sports associations and organisers, we need to get it right!