By Neto Baptiste
The 2024 National Sports Awards that will reward the country’s top athletes for their performances over the past year, will be held on March 15 next year.
This is according to head of the awards’ organising committee, Cleofoster Harris, who said the deadline for the submission of all nominations by associations and federations is November 30.
He revealed, however, that there could be a change in the format of the awards ceremony, adding that a final decision must be made by the relevant authorities.
“We are working in the background to come up with a shift [in venue] and change and probably look at reverting back to what we used to have in terms of a nice sit down or official function so that is something that is up for discussion with the minister but we are looking at the finances. I think that it’s a two-fold argument as to whether it should remain as is or go back to previous years and have it more as a prestigious event,” he said.
Harris revealed there have been several meetings with associations and judges as the committee seek to make the nomination process as seamless as possible for all involved.
“That [meetings], have been a slight game-changer and we are advocating now to have, at the end of the process which is the deadline, to have additional meetings with the associations and federations,” the committee head said.
The official said the response has been favourable thus far which he believes could be credited to a new rigorous education process and a promise by sports minister, Daryll Mathew, to limit funding to those associations and federations who fail to make submissions.
“We have seen an increase in terms of more associations making their submissions to the awards and we’ve seen the regular associations and federations making their requests to the ADARP programme for funding so I guess that was just a way to encourage more federations and associations to take part in the process,” Harris said.
Fitness athlete, Ambassador Kimberly Percival and kiteboarder Tiger Tyson captured the women’s and men’s senior crowns last year, while sprinters Kasiya Daley and LaNica Locker were named the Junior male and female athletes of the year.
