#PSAForum: Ramirez hopes that PSC's decision to slash athlete's allowances are just temporary

For Philippine Sports Commission chair William Ramirez, the decision to slash the monthly allowance of national athletes is harsh, but necessary in the short term, given the effect of the novel coronavirus pandemic was immense in the world of sports.

“Our commitment is that once our collection from PAGCOR resumes, we will return to normal,” he said.

In the return of the Philippine Sportswriters Association Forum yesterday, he hopes that the 50% cut is just a temporary thing, given the decline of the remittances given to them by the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation in the past two months since the shutdown of the gaming activities in line with the lockdown imposed by the government.

“Otherwise, if we continued with the regular allowance, we wouldn’t last until December,” he then said in the first-ever online forum of the PSA, in which he cited that the drastic decline of PAGCOR's contributions owing to the pandemic.

With the current set-up, the elite athletes under the watch of the PSC are set to receive a monthly allowance of forty-five thousand pesos (P45,000) and those who are in the training pool are given ten thousand pesos (P10,000).

However, the current health crisis has put a massive dent on to the plans of the commission. And that has brought nothing but sadness for Ramirez, who was on his second tour of duty as the head of the PSC.

“It breaks our hearts. Pero kapag bumalik yan (NSDF), we are committed to spend it for the athletes. The purpose of that funding is to spend it,” Ramirez added.

The state-owned corporation, which has the flagship Casino Filipino under them, is the primary source  of funding by the PSC, given that on an average, they received P150 Million pesos per month on a normal basis, in which it is turned to a National Sports Development Fund for their elite and grassroots programs.

But the pandemic has put the contributions on a rapid decline,  with the PSC only receiving P99 Million in March, and by April it shrunk further to just nine million pesos as the gaming industry has been totally shut down in compliance to the state regulations of the quarantine.

With the current crisis, the commission has faced an uncertain future, even if normal services resume by bits and pieces owing to the downgrading of the lockdown levels has given them a semblance of hope for things ahead.

“With no money from PAGCOR, that will be the end of the elite and grassroots program,” he said.

Photo is from Philippine Sportswriters Association (File)