A whole day pre-departure activities that serves as a sendoff for the Southeast Asian Games-bound Philippine delegation will be held today at the Philippine Olympic Committee headquarters inside the Philsports compound in Pasig city.
Today?s affair, held under the auspices of the POC, is actually the second in as many days following another sendoff ceremony hosted by the Philippine Sports Commission held Wednesday at a restaurant in Sta. Cruz District in the heart o Manila, bailiwick of PSC chair Harry Angping and wife and Congresswoman Naida Angping.
The only difference is that attendees in today?s rites are the members of the entire 251-athlete contingent plus their coaches and delegation officials, which, for the past several weeks had been fragmented as a result of the POC-PSC feud. The PSC affair was attended by only some 100 of the 153 athletes being funded by the government agency.
Today?s affair starts at around 10 a.m. with the PSC handing out the official sets of uniforms ? social, parade and competition ? allowances and plane tickets.
Main highlight of the day?s event is Holy Mass to be held at 6 p.m. to be attended also by delegation officials, headed by POC president Jose ?Peping? Cojuangco. An executive committee meeting precedes the Mass, according to POC spokeperson Joey Romasanta.
On Sunday, the athletes will again be divided as they will be taking separate Philippine Airlines chartered flights that will bring them to the City of Vientiane, the main hub of the 25th edition of the biennial meet.
In Wednesday?s affair, Angping distributed each attendees their $30 per day allowance, which if added covering Dec. 6-19 will amount to $420 per athlete. Add the additional $100 from the PSC and the athletes stand to bring home $520 (more or less P24,000) each.
It was not known though how much the POC will give each athlete considering that the additional 98 athletes the agency will be bringing will be funded from the fund-raising campaign it conducted from the private sector.
Besides the SEA games financial benefits, Angping, likewise, dangled an attractive incentive package for the Asian Games in what he said is to make sure the Filipino athletes going to Guangzhou next year will come up with a better finish.
From the law-mandated P500,000 incentives, Angping raised the Asian Games? pot to P1 million aside from other perks and bonuses that might come from the private sector as the competition draws near
?The athletes that will bring home the gold medal (in the Asian Games) stand to receive P1 million,? Angping said during the send-off party thrown for the SEA Games-bound athletes Wednesday night. ?This is the motivation that I want all of you to look forward to. Kung kaya ng ibang bansa, kaya din ng Pinoy.?
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