Patience pays off

Samahang Basketbol Ng Pilipinas (SBP) executive director Sonny Barrios said the other day he’s convinced that if not for Manny V. Pangilinan’s hands-on approach, attention to detail, perseverance and love of country, Manila wouldn’t have been awarded the hosting rights for the FIBA-Asia Championships on Aug. 1-11.

“My exposure to MVP throughout this difficult process has made me realize why he’s such a successful executive,” said Barrios referring to the SBP president and PLDT chairman. “Now, I’m not surprised why he is who he is. As a subordinate, you can’t afford to go at a slower pace than your boss. If MVP is running at 60 miles per hour, you can’t go 40 miles per hour. You’ll be embarrassed to get left behind so you try to keep up. That’s how it was during the process that we went through in finally winning the hosting rights.”

Barrios, a former PBA commissioner, said the idea of hosting the FIBA-Asia Championships was hatched after the Wuhan tournament in 2011. “Wuhan was the Asian qualifier for the London Olympics and we finished fourth,” said Barrios. “There was only one slot for Asia in London. The chances of making it in Wuhan were slim and we spent millions to prepare for it. But we realized that for the FIBA World Championships, there are three slots for Asia and the qualifier is the FIBA-Asia Championships in 2013.  We figured that since we were just a win away from third place in Wuhan, we stand a good chance to make it to the top three and qualify for the World Championships especially if we host the qualifiers. MVP understood the situation immediately.”

Barrios said FIBA-Asia sent a form to member countries asking to signify interest in hosting any of the events in 2013. “MVP told me it wouldn’t be enough to just tick the box for the FIBA-Asia Championships, that we should send the form with a covering letter,” related Barrios. “So I drafted the covering letter, e-mailed it to MVP and the next day, I was called for a lunch meeting. MVP had only a sandwich for lunch and so did I. The draft went through two passes, line by line, before he approved it. MVP suggested that to make it a strong statement, both he as SBP president and I as SPB executive-director would sign the covering letter. He wanted it to be sent to FIBA-Asia before the deadline and instructed me to request FIBA-Asia secretary-general Hagop Khajirian that before the Central Board decides on which country would host, if we could make a presentation of our proposal. Mr. Khajirian later informed me that he would also give the same privilege to others bidding for the hosting rights.”

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The Central Board met in December 2011 but the agenda did not include a discussion on the hosting rights. Then came the FIBA-Asia Congress in Kuala Lumpur last May. Barrios attended the Congress and sought a private meeting with Khajirian to find out the status of SBP’s bid. Khajirian said the matter would be taken up at the FIBA-Asia Executive Committee meeting during the FIBA-Asia Cup, formerly known as the Stankovic Cup, in Tokyo in September. 

“Mr. Khajirian had a little misgiving about where the games would be held in Manila,” said Barrios. “He wasn’t impressed with the existing facilities.  I informed him that a new stadium, the MOA Arena, had just opened and it would be the main venue for the competition.” When Barrios returned to Manila, he reported to Pangilinan what transpired in his conversation with Khajirian. Right there and then, Pangilinan told Barrios to invite Khajirian to Manila for an ocular inspection of the MOA Arena. Barrios relayed the invitation which Khajirian accepted.

“Mr. Khajirian arrived last August and we booked him in a suite at Sofitel,” said Barrios. “Moying Martelino, Bernie Atienza and I toured Mr. Khajirian around the MOA Arena with Arnel Gonzales and he was impressed. Then, we toured the Ninoy Aquino stadium, our option as a secondary venue, with PSC commissioner Iggy Clavecilla. That night, MVP hosted a dinner in his honor. Mr. Khajirian was concerned about a conflict in schedule with the PBA and MVP assured him of total cooperation. In fact, MVP told Mr. Khajirian for the Tokyo presentation, PBA commissioner Chito Salud would be present.”

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As it turned out, the FIBA-Asia Executive Committee chose Beirut as the host with Manila the second choice if the Lebanon capital wouldn’t be able to exercise the privilege. The choice was made because Beirut was supposed to host in 2011 but gave up the rights to Wuhan. “At first, we were upset because we felt our presentation was unbeatable,” said Barrios. “But we eventually simmered down. After two weeks, MVP instructed me to draft a letter to FIBA-Asia in a courteous and diplomatic tenor, mentioning that if Manila would be awarded the rights for any reason, it should be relayed to us on or before Nov. 30 as the preferred day to give us enough lead time to prepare considering the break during the Christmas and Easter holidays.”

Barrios sent the letter to Khajirian but received no reply. He sent a follow-up letter but still no word from Khajirian. “MVP called for a meeting to discuss the status,” said Barrios. “Mr. (Ricky) Vargas was in the meeting when MVP told me to forget about writing letters, that it was time to see Mr. Khajirian personally. I found out that on Dec. 1, Mr. Khajirian would be in Kuala Lumpur for a FIBA-Asia meeting and a 3-on-3 competition. I knew that last October, Beirut hosted the FIBA-Asia Champions Cup but the finals couldn’t be played as the tournament was cancelled because of peace and order issues. Of course, I didn’t want to raise this as a reason for pushing our bid and I didn’t want to badger Mr. Khajirian.”

Tomorrow, we’ll take up Game 4 of the PBA Philippine Cup Finals and on Thursday, we’ll continue our story-telling of how Manila won the bid to host the FIBA-Asia Championships.