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Home / Athletes cry foul over Paralympian presence at sports awards
Athletes cry foul over Paralympian presence at sports awards
2016-11-01Staff Report 2 "Windhoek In what can be interpreted as sour grapes – and rightly so – voices of discontent can be heard murmuring loudly in the corridors of aggrieved sporting codes and disgruntled athletes who lost out on the podium for this year’s NSC Sports Awards. Last weekend’s NSC annual sports awards ceremony left a bitter aftertaste in the mouth of some athletes and affiliates, who failed to make the cut for the short-listed candidates. Local boxing trainer Imms Moses, whose nomination for the prestigious Coach of the Year award was dismissed by the NSC panel of judges as a result of discrepancies in his motivation, is a man possessed. The usually calculated boxing guru pulled no punches, as he climbed bare-knuckled into what he termed “an unfair methodology” used to judge disabled athletes. “It’s my personal view and conviction that disable-bodied athletes should not be placed in the same category as able-bodied athletes, simply because the volume of competition is miles apart. Moses is adamant that Paralympic athletes would always enjoy a slight competitive edge over able-bodied athletes since their competitive level does not require the same intensity as boxers and other high-profile sport events. Well known local Otjiherero radio (Omurari) sports announcer Rodman Katjaimo also expressed concern over the points system and called for a review on the allocation of baseline points. Katjaimo specifically mentioned the conspicuous absence of the national Under-17 football team from the shortlist of contenders for the Team of the Year award following their historic triumph in the regional COSAFA Youth Cup in Mauritius this year. Although Katjaimo is fully conversant with the voting pattern, the vocal popular radio sports presenter has requested the hierarchy to revisit the points allocation for regional competitions. “It’s a known fact that the level of competition differs significantly when it comes to certain sports codes, football in particular. In all honesty, football will take ages to qualify for global showpiece, the FIFA World Cup, if one takes into consideration the extremely thorny journey in the preliminaries and subsequently the qualifiers, whereas rugby can qualify after three or four rounds of matches against continental lightweights for that matter,” he pointed out. " 2016-11-01Staff Report 2
