Sport makes you a better human being

POLICE Commissioner Gary Griffith believes sport is essential in stopping crime and sports programmes are crucial, but members of sporting groups say in order to provide positive avenues for children this country needs to pump more money into youth groups.

Griffith was part of a panel discussing the impact of crime on tourism and the impact of sport on crime during the fourth Sport Industry TT Conference at Hyatt Regency, Port of Spain, yesterday.

Griffith was joined by TT Defence Force Major Jason Hills, general manager at Cara Suites Hotel Hassel Thom and sociology lecturer at the University of the West Indies Dr Anand Rampersad.

Griffith said, “Sports provides all of the opportunities not just to make you a good sportsman, but also to make you a good human being and the character traits you have in sport is totally opposite to being a criminal.

“In sport, it builds your character in all the departments required for you to be a good human being from discipline, leadership, uniformity, tactics, being able to adjust, sticking to the game plan.”

In an emotional plea, Nikeisha Lewis of The North Coast Sports Academy said she sometimes feels she is turning in circles in an effort to get more support for her academy.

“Because I am come from the north coast I really wanted people to understand how rural communities are left out by all NGOs (National Governing Organisations). When I do my proposals, I go to the Ministry of Sports because if I carry it to other people what they say is ‘This is a sports thing, you have a sports group, why you don’t go to the Ministry of Sports,’ and when I go to the Ministry of Sports I hear, ‘We have no funding Nikeisha, but you doing a good job.’ A good job does not really help me to implement my programmes.”

The North Coast Sports Academy is involved in a number of sports such as kayaking, swimming, netball and cricket, along with environmental projects.

Griffith agrees that more should be done for sports groups in TT saying, “As the Commissioner of Police, I am aware of secondary crime prevention by getting young persons away from crime.”

In response to Lewis, Thom said this is an opportunity for corporate TT to support. Tobagonian Thom, who has a close affiliation to the North coast after spending part of his childhood in La Fillette, said, “What she has just highlighted is the perfect opportunity for corporate Trinidad to assist facilitated by the Ministry of Sport.....she is right those are the ways that we can positively impact the social fabric of this country.”

Rampersad said parents must see the value of sports. “We need to get their parents involved as well, we can’t just target them. If we looking at that secondary support system, where you get the parents involved and they see the value they can also help reinforce things along with churches, the mosque and the temples.”