National Embarrassment by Bahamian Elite Athletes in an Olympic year! PART ONE!

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Track file photo.

BP calls for an immediate OUT OF SEASON doping test on all Bahamian athletes – Prime Minister and his minister must step in…

Nassau, Bahamas — In the Bible there is a story of a man who prepared a great feast and invited all his friends to join the banquet table, but when the call went out, letters returned with excuses.

In just under a month from now, the City of London will come alive to play host to the 2012 Olympic games and there is something damning that is happening in the Bahamas leading to the event.

This is not good.

Last week the Bahamas held its Olympic trials at the old Thomas A. Robinson Stadium. Sports executives had the money to carry the trials live on TV to show who the National Champions are before the team head to the UK for competition – but guess what happened? The games were not on TV and some ten of the country’s elite athletes failed to show.

Like the friends of that great master in the Bible, they sent their excuses, one by one.

Some say they were injured, some say they were sick and some, in defiance of the Sports Authority, just never showed up for the great nationals sports meet.

It’s UNBELIEVABLE! But this is just the beginning of our story.

This is not good.

Minister of Youth Sports and Culture Hon. Danny Johnson, must break silence on sports scandal devoloping before Olympics.

Both the United States and Jamaica held their Nationals live on TV this weekend, and we made an error believing it was also last week.  In the case of Jamaica, a new record holder in the Mens 100 emerged. In that competition Yohan Blake beat the fastest man in the world, Usain Bolt, and was crowned the new National Champion of Jamaica in that race.

But in the Bahamas something very suspicious is developing. Our men have gone missing. Just vanished from the face of the earth for some strange reason. Some failed to show up at our Nationals last week and, since the BAAAs said they were going to have a makeup this weekend, guess what happened … not one athlete who failed to show fitness last week showed up this week at that makeup meet this weekend.

UNTHINKABLE INDEED! In fact to make matters worse, the men was to appear in Jamaica this weekend for competition, but no one could be found.

Yes, and get this, we know they all want to make the team. But that cannot be.

In an Olympic year athletes must know this is the granddaddy of all sports events. Every four years this is where you make your name in sports. This is where we in the Bahamas get our biggest advertising. And so, we envisioned and constructed a National Stadium for them. We pay them subventions. We work scholarships for them. We send them free of charge with chaperons around the world to compete. We make sure they are fitted with the best training offered to any other athlete in the world and, to top it all off, we created an entire Sports Ministry, and guess what? Some – with no discipline whatsoever – in an Olympic year – failed to show fitness.

What a disgrace to the country.

Bahamas Press is therefore calling on the powers that be to immediately do the following!

1)    Disqualify every athlete who failed to show fitness in the the Nationals. Save the name of the Bahamas!

2)    Remove the subvention from every athlete who participated in that boycott last week.

3)    Sports Executives must – for the first time – establish a list of credible “recognized” medical doctors who are assigned to examine and write proper medical letters for the sports authorities in the country. Stop allowing any and every doctor from providing written medical letters for athletes. Fact is we should not be carrying injured people for the ride!

4)    Hold an immediate OUT OF SEASON doping test on all Bahamian athletes and those who refused to show, banning them from all sporting events representing the country.

In part two of this Sunday Special we ga tell you why the OUT OF SEASON doping test is so important.

We report, yinner decide.