TOC wants associations to live up to expectation

Tanzania Olympic Committee (TOC) Secretary General Filbert Bayi has urged every sports association in the country to perform their duties when speaking at a press conference in Dar es Salaam, yesterday.

“Sports associations are required to perform their duties instead of avoiding them when they prepare teams for local and international competitions,“ Bayi insisted.

The secretary general’s statement is a response to accusations recently leveled against TOC in the media. TOC has been accused for the failure of supporting sports associations in preparation of their teams.

According to Bayi, the functions of TOC basically is not to assist various sports associations to prepare their sportsmen or women and teams in their respective sports.

The main functions of TOC are to encourage participation of sports associations in all African, Commonwealth and Olympic Games, to educate sports trainers, coaches, experts and leaders.

Nevertheless, Bayi added that TOC has been supporting sports associations whenever it has the financial capacity to do so, such as in the preparations of All African Games in Abuja (2003) and Algiers (2007) because the sports received financial assistance from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) through its Olympic Solidarity department.

He further urged sports associations to strive to recruit players with talents who could be able to become champions.

As a result, they could attract sponsorship which will enable sports associations to have income for preparing their teams for future tournaments.

Meanwhile, TOC Secretary General Filbert Bayi has announced the Tanzanian contingent for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

The contingent will have a total of 20 people, including players and officials.

The names and the categories to be involved in the Games are as follows;
Athletics (5); Fabian Joseph (10,000m), Masenduki Mohamed (marathon), Getuli Bayo (marathon), Marwa Dickson (10,000m) and Samson Ramadhani (marathon)

Boxing; Emilian Patrick Polino (54kg Bantamweight)
Swimming; Magdalena Moshi and Khalid Rushaka
Youth Camp; Tyler Lyimo (Mainland) and Marissa Rosaleen Barreto (Zanzibar)

Coaches and officials are;
Nassor Irenge (Boxing), John Belela (Swimming), Charles Nyange (`Chef` de Mission), Elias Maige (Doctor) and Jamal Adi (Administration). Athletics has not yet named its coach.

Leaders who will go in their official capacities are George Mkuchika (Minister for Information, Culture and Sports), Gulam Rashid (President TOC), Filbert Bayi (Secretary General TOC) and Gen (ret.) Mirisho Sarakikya (Invited by the International Olympic Committee).

• SOURCE: Guardian