The City Sports Development Office will embark on a pilot program called City Sports Athletic Partnership in cooperation with the City Mayor’s Office (CMO) which will actively involve the private sectors to train certain out of school youths and lumads under their care with no cost at the most.
“It is a program that we enable the private sector to develop the athletes from the grass root level meaning to say out of school youth and lumad because we feel that there are a lot of athletic individuals here in Davao City that needs to be exposed, they just don’t have the means to engage in sporting activity because they don’t have money,” said Michael Aportadera officer in-charge of the Sports and Development Division-City Mayor’s Office (SDD-CMO) during the Ispeak media forum at the City Hall on February 15, Thursday
Aportadera said they will start with a handful number of individuals selected by the City Social Services and Development Office (CSSDO) that will be developed by the National Sporting Association (NSA).
He said this program will be launched on the end of March this year.
“We are giving them the chance to develop themselves this program is a long term relationship with the private sector that will launched after the DAVRAA (Davao Regional Athletic Association)
He said that private sector like University of Mindanao has agreed to put up a program for the city and in partnership with them to train athletics for free and even to the extent of scholarship.
“You’ll be surprised how cooperative the private sectors are in terms of sponsoring the training and the development of this out of school youth and our lumads selected by the CSSDO,” He said
Aportadera said that this is in preparation of the Batang Pinoy that is why they are putting up the Palarong Panglungsod within the year because they want those individuals that they think has the capability and the potential to play in different sport event like badminton, rugby football, football etc.
“Batang Pinoy was mainly created for the out of school youth but now it seems like the players are no longer the out of school youth and I’m trying to bring that back and we will start with the City probably that the other local government will follow,” he said.
