The Archery Association of Namibia (AAN) has slammed the Namibia Sport Awards as ‘a joke’ after four of its archers, who became world champions this year were not amongst the finalists for the awards on Friday evening.
Senior archer Beatrix van der Merwe and juniors Hofmeyer van Blerk, Oliver Rohrmuller and Eunice Pieterse won gold medals in their categories at the World Field Archery Championships in Windhoek earlier this year, but were not recognised at the awards ceremony.
At a press conference on Saturday morning, the president of AAN Jan van Blerk accused the Namibia Sport Commission of incompetence, saying that it was totally unacceptable to them.
“For us this is totally unacceptable. If the Sport Commission don’t want to recognise us as a sport code then we will in future participate on our own without national colours. The medals that we win will then be ours and not the country’s,” he said.
Archery’s problems started two weeks before the awards when a list of the finalists in the various categories was published in the local media. When the four archers that the AAN had nominated did not appear amongst the finalists, Van Blerk immediately contacted the NSC to enquire what had happened with their nominations.
After an investigation it came to light that archery’s nominations list got lost. The NSC decided to enter them as late entrants, and asked the judging panel to still consider them for the awards. The judging panel did evaluate and consider them for the awards, but at the awards ceremony their names did not appear anywhere amongst the finalists while they were also not called up on stage.
Van Blerk said he did not know what to tell the finalists who made a special effort to be there.
“Some of the finalists had to come from Swakopmund, while others had other engagements but they made a special effort to be there, expecting to receive recognition for their achievements. How can I explain this to a junior who is only nine years old? We demand an explanation from the Ministry and have called for a meeting with the NSC for Monday,” he said.
“At the awards ceremony, I asked the chairman of the NSC Stanley Simaata why we were not amongst the finalists and he apologised profusely,” he said.
Waiting for outstanding money
Regarding the World Field Archery Championships that Namibia hosted in April, Van Blerk said that AAN was still waiting for N$230 000 promised to them by the NSC to help stage the event.
“We actually budgeted for less but were told by the former Minister of Sport, John Mutorwa to increase our budget to make it a high level event. The Ministry said that they would contribute N$230 000 to the event but we are still waiting for that money and in the end we had to pay for the expenses ourselves,” he said.
“Two months later I enquired about the money and Rusten Mogane said I should write a letter that he would take through the necessary channels. On Friday evening I asked Stanley Simaata whether he had received that letter and he said he knew nothing about it,” he said.
When approached for comment Mogane said that he did not receive the names of the archers, although it was submitted to the NSC by the judging panel.
Regarding the outstanding fees from the World Championships, he said that he had held two meetings with Van Blerk and Shivute Katamba of the Ministry of Sport.
“Katamba promised that the money will reach them, so they have to take it up with the Ministry,” he said.