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Creation of Department of Sports sought
A bill has been filed in the Senate seeking to create a Department of Sports, a Cabinet-level agency that would be in charge of developing and promoting sports programs in the country. According to Senate Bill No. 3092, filed by Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV, the department will be "the primary policy, planning, coordinating, implementing, regulating and administrative entity of the executive branch of the Government that will plan, promote and help develop sports and physical fitness in the country." The promotion and development of sports in the country was among the functions of the Department of Education, Culture and Sports (DECS) until the department was renamed the Department of Education (DepEd) in 2001. In his explanatory note, Trillanes said 21 years after its creation, the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC), which is supposed to "oversee, reform, and jumpstart the state of Philippine sports," has yet to fully accomplish its mandate. "The PSC failed to neither surpass nor even just approximate the many successes that the country produced in the field of sports with the likes of Akiko Thompson, Lydia De Vega, Elma Muros, Paeng Nepomuceno, Eric Buhain, and Efren "Bata" Reyes, among many others," he said. The PSC was created by virtue of Republic Act No. 6847 in 1990. "This bill seeks to create a Department of Sports that shall take the lead in providing the much needed leadership in sports development in the Philippines. [It] shall provide necessary impetus, direction, and policy guidance in order to improve the performance of the country in international sporting events and competitions, Said agency shall likewise take the lead in developing Filipino athletes to their fullest potentials," Trillanes said. Under the measure, the Department of Sports shall perform the following functions:
- advise the President on all matters pertaining to sports in general;
- prescribe the criteria and standards for the recognition of national sports associations in different sports in the Philippines;
- prescribe criteria and standards for the participation of athletes and teams in international competitions;
- coordinate the activities of, and to facilitate cooperation among, the various sectors involved in sports, including among others, the National Sports Associations, public and private schools, government corporations and entities, local government units, the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and other sports organizations and private corporations;
- encourage and organize, in consultation with the national sports associations and related organizations, national, regional and international sports competitions, events and games;
- develop and implement programs for the recognition and development of: persons who excel, or who have the potential to excel, in sport; and persons who have achieved, or who have the potential to achieve, standards of excellence as sports coaches, umpires, referees or officials essential to the conduct of sports;
- plan and promote physical education in the Philippines;
- initiate, encourage and facilitate research and development in relation to sports;
- undertake research and development related to sports science and sports medicine; and
- establish, develop and maintain fully-equipped sports facilities and centers in strategic places in the country and, as far as practicable, such modern sports complexes adequate for major international and regional competitions, events and games, among others.
