THE Rio Olympics are now history and while the athletes who represented us did not exactly shake up the world, what we did in fact achieve was to continue putting the name of St Lucia out there in the international arena as a country capable of producing athletes who are can compete at the highest level.
We will not discussi the performance of our standard bearer, high jumper Levern Spencer. That too is history. Despite the disappointment that many feel about her performance, the fact is that Miss Spencer has gone where no one has ever gone before in the pursuit of St Lucia’s first Olympic medal and for that, she deserves our collective appreciation. Indeed, her treasure chest of medals speaks volumes.
But what of the future? We refer here not merely to future participation in the Olympic Games but rather to our plans for the development of sports in general. We have always been of the view—and this has been stated in these columns—as long as more than two decades ago—that St Lucia was not spending enough on sports. In fact, in successive years, around budget time, we lobbied, albeit unsuccessfully for the government to put aside a million dollars for sports development.
It never happened, but the need is still there, only that it continues to be more urgent. We believe that if we are serious about curbing youth deviance in all its forms, we need to create opportunities for them to be positively engaged. We believe sports and the arts are two avenues that have the capacity to create opportunities for our young men and women to unleash their talents and find fulfilment. Look at the thousands who are at this time engaged in these two pursuits.
The call is again timely with the head of the local Olympic movement, Mrs. Fortuna Belrose, who has been associated with sports for a number of years, now sitting in the Cabinet. We have to believe that there is no time like the present for sports to take its rightful place in the overall business of this country. Sports must become not only a pastime but equally an avenue to build discipline and character in our young people to divert them away from the decadence that is so prevalent in St. Lucia these days. It simply is mind-boggling the fact that we as a country have closed our eyes and ears to the systematic destruction of our young people with so much organized perversion that lures them into an ever widening web of depravity.
In a television interview this week, Mrs. Belrose made a plea for improved sports infrastructure. We support that call but recommend as well the development of structured sports agenda for the entire country with plans put in place and specific goals set. For instance, can we identify a handful of hopefuls and begin to train them with the Olympics of 2024 in mind?
We hear a lot about talent in our schools but is there a programme in place to seriously prepare them for the future? Do we have good coaches that we can employ to train and mentor these young people so that we stop losing them to crime and its associates?
Even if we never have another Olympic hopeful, it will be worth it if St Lucia begins to look at sports as a tool for human development, the development of our young men and women into solid, respectful and upstanding citizens. If in the process we get Olympic material out of them, more glory to us all.