ASA vows to build a winning nation

The newly elected executive of Athletics South Africa led by president James Moloi has vowed to hit the ground running as it endeavours to build a winning nation in the track and field space.

Addressing a press conference to outline the way forward for the new administration, Moloi, who will have to relinquish his presidency of Central Gauteng Athletics following his ascendency to being the ASA boss, said they will rope in ASA legends to help build and uplift structures of the organisation and ensure that athletes are well catered for in competitions.

“Our job as board members of ASA is to take care of the interests of athletes and we will do that by making sure athletes are well paid by increasing payments for various events and finding corporate sponsors for most of all our events, including securing broadcast rights.

“Talks are already under way with various potential broadcast partners and once a deal is brokered with whomever, only then we shall be in a position to announce who the broadcast partner will be. I understand that we may already have some agreements somewhere, signed or unsigned and we will have to revisit those and renegotiate them were necessary.”

As part of building a winning nation, Moloi said they have plans to send some of their prospective championship athletes overseas in order to improve their standing and competitiveness at international level. “This too needs us to engage the corporate world if we’re to make a success of it.”

Moloi said legends athletics will be brought on board for administrative responsibilities, workshops, and even taken on courses to ensure they were well prepared in order to play a big role in the development of future athletes of this country.

“We want to build a winning nation and we can only achieve this by brining on board people that have already walked this mile and know clearly what is required. Eighty per cent of our board members are former athletes and are all ploughing back to the sport. Gender parity is also 50–50.”

Board member Jean Verster, who is chairperson of the Track and Field Committee, said there was nothing more demoralising to an athlete like qualifying for events and then they are told they cannot go due to insufficient funding to accommodate all of them.

“We want to overcome this scenario and ensure that all athletes that qualify for events are flown to events to compete. The poor athletes under vigorous training methods and energy-sipping qualification rounds – and no one will want to undergo this kind of test – only to be told they cannot go due to lack of funds.

“We want every athlete that qualifies to represent the country to be afforded that opportunity to go and compete, so that they don’t despair and feel the torture was just a waste of time. Our mandate as the board is to go out there and find the money, and this is what we are going to do as the new executive.”