PSC vows to check NSAs

The Philippine Sports Commission said it would tighten the screw on national sports association that refuse to be placed under its scrutiny as it bared a move to crack down on fly-by-night, under-achieving or “ghost” NSAs.

Commissioner Ritchie Garcia, who handles NSA affairs for the PSC, yesterday said they are asking all NSAs to submit to them a few basic requirements starting this year.

The PSC, Garcia added, “will stop granting any financial assistance” to those who fail to comply. The PSC spends millions each year funding the NSAs and their athletes.

The NSAs must submit to the PSC their constitutions and by-laws, incorporations, an updated list of their current officers and copies of their registration with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“We need to know who their officers are and how they are elected. There are NSAs that never had any elections the past many years. We also want their by-laws and incorporations,” said Garcia.

“We want to learn more about their election procedures and criteria for membership. Some NSAs have voting members who were just appointed by their sec-gens or whoever,” he added.

Garcia said the Philippine Olympic Committee under Jose “Peping” Cojuangco is also doing its share in requiring from their NSAs an updated set of their by-laws and officers.

“If they don’t have SEC registrations then maybe they can show us their POC registrations. We want an updated list of their sets of officers,” said Garcia.

The POC commissioner cited one NSA as an example.

“I’ve been with the PSC for a long time and I’ve never met the president of this NSA personally. There’s always someone else signing papers or checks with us and sometimes it’s not even the sec-gen.”

“What we’re asking is not a difficult task. It’s just a basic requirement,” Garcia added.

Garcia drew the ire of some NSAs last year when he implemented a new PSC policy where those with unliquidated cash advances will not and cannot receive any financial assistance from the agency.  Since then, unliquidated advances close to P80 million were cleared by the NSAs.

“It’s not easy implementing new rules. But we had to do it (rules on cash advances) or we will be the ones responsible to the government’s audit system,” he added.