Africa-Press – Tanzania. THE government has set December 31st this year as the deadline to receive plans, guidelines and fixtures of all flag carriers of sport disciplines eligible to represent the country in in International games.
This was said on Tuesday by the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry for Information, Culture, Arts and Sports Hassan Abbasi who said the move has been reached to enable government scrutinise them.
“Gone are the days when we used to hear that a certain sport discipline from Tanzania competed in a particular international event and occupied 99th place out of 100 competitors. “Government now wants to be close to these flag carrier sport disciplines by giving them a helping hand for them to have adequate preparations before they fly out to represent the country in major competitions outside the boundaries,” he said.
He continued: “For now, government through the National Sports Council (NSC) would like to have on the desk plans, fixtures and budget for all sport federations whose teams will tussle up in International games next year to avoid poor preparation excuses when they fail to do well in such contests.”
Moreover, Abbasi noted that if a certain sport discipline would like to travel to a particular country for further preparations before heading to the battlefield, it will be the duty of the government to ensure that enough resources are provided for them.
“For example, if we have a team which will compete in Olympic games, we need to know their plans, how they will prepare and their budget likewise a team which will compete in AFCON. We deserve to have key details prior to the event itself for us to gather the required resources. “All these are encouraged so that if we win, we should win together also, if we lose, we should lose together…this is what we want to see happening as the government in collaboration with private stakeholders,” he narrated.
In another development, Abbasi disclosed that they have succeeded to open a branch at Benjamin Mkapa Stadium in Dar es Salaam of Malya College of Sports Development.
“We have opted to open Malya branch in the city to enable sport stakeholders upgrade their skills and we have started with short term courses but as time goes, we will embrace long term ones. “On Monday, I was privileged to give a lecture to spokespersons of clubs on what they ought to do when executing their responsibilities through making sure that they do not go beyond the requirements of their profession,” said Abbasi.
