MVP maintains Lina still member of panel

PLDT/Smart Communications chairman Manny V. Pangilinan, the chair of the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas, said yesterday he regretted former Senator Joey Lina’s decision to resign from the BasketballAssociation of the Philippines but maintained that he still considered him as member of the three-man panel.

He also said Lina remains a trustee of SBP since these positions are not coterminous with his position as BAP president.

Pangilinan also expressed hopes that the panel’s work will be completed as scheduled since significant progress has been substantially, and independently, achieved in meeting the objectives of the recent Tokyo communiqué.

In a letter sent to FIBA secretary-general Patrick Baumann yesterday, the three-man panel said that once the Unity Congress is convened on Oct. 21 and the officers of SBP elected by the Board of Trustees on the same day, it will have completed its task of forging unity in Philippine basketball as set out in the Tokyo pact.

Thereafter, the SBP will seek the accreditation of the POC and officially seek FIBA’s consent to lift the suspension of the Philippines.

The panel is now in the final phase of its preparations for the holding of a Unity Congress where all of the BAP and PB members recognized as probationary SBP members would be invited.

During the Unity Congress, the panel also plans to hold an organizational meeting of the board of trustees of SBP to elect its officers, including the chairman, president, executive director, corporate secretary and treasurer.

To facilitate the conduct of an orderly and peaceful election of officers, the panel has consulted the BAP, PB and the other sectors involved in Philippine basketball to draw up a list of acceptable candidates. These include the country’s major stakeholders such as the PB, PBA, PBL, NCAA and the UAAP, which have all expressed support for the election of MVP as concurrent chairman and president of SBP. — Dante Navarro