Despite a few impediments here and there, sport ministry executive director Audrin Mathe has maintained that the intentions of the national sports reward policy remain well intact, but a few screws should, however, be tightened.
In 2018, government approved the implementation of the national sports reward policy, which aims to motivate and handsomely reward athletes who scoop accolades at regional, continental and global stages.
But since the policy’s introduction, there have been some hiccups around its implementation, as many a time, funds are not readily available to reward the various winners. That has over the years caused serious friction between the line ministry, the Namibia Sports Commission and the various intended beneficiaries.
“I think the importance of this policy is to motivate and reward our athletes, especially when they win medals at big competitions. It is vital because, at the end of the day, it’s the country that wins and not just individual athletes. So, I still maintain that the intentions of the policy remain good and that’s why Cabinet approved it.
“The challenge, however, is that for the past six to seven years, the country has gone through some economic challenges and that has had an impact on our ability to honour our financial obligations to the various deserving winners. But despite those problems, I say the policy is great and we should just continue to work on it,” he said during a wide-ranging interview with New Era Sport.
As per the policy, an athlete who wins gold at the Olympics is guaranteed to pocket N$200 000, N$150 000 for silver and N$100 000 for bronze at the Olympic Games, while for winners at the World Championships, a gold medal fetches N$100 000, silver N$80 000 and bronze N$50 000.
The policy also makes provision for trainers and coaches, with their rewards ranging from N$80 000 to N$100 000 for the various winners at regional, continental and world major competitions.
“The commitment is there and I just hope in the next two years, the situation will improve and our athletes will be rewarded as they should. In fact, in neighbouring countries like Botswana, they have started to go big with their reward policies as athletes are now getting houses for winning medals at the Olympics and so forth.
“We recently had a conversation with our colleagues from the sports commission on how we can fund sports, and we were looking at the idea of introducing a national lottery to help fund sport. Maybe, we could then get a percentage from lottery money and invest it into sport,” said Mathe.
He noted that setting up a national sports fund is also another idea they have been looking at, as that will help pull resources together and enlarge the funding streams.
“We can then encourage the private sector to pump money into the trust fund to benefit our athletes.”
- mkambukwe@nepc.com.na