By Neto Baptiste
An irate parent is taking the Antigua and Barbuda Athletics Association (ABAA) to task over the omission of her son from the country’s Carifta team.
Monique Franklyn, the mother of 400 meters athlete Kiron O’Garro, said her son was de-selected as a member of the Carifta team just days prior to the team’s departure for the meet in the Bahamas and that no one had bothered to properly inform the athlete.
“I mean, you done select a group and the whole world know that the child was going and all of a sudden now he is not going and you didn’t call that one person to tell him that he’s not going anymore and he had to find out from somebody else. Is that fair? He had to be calling to ask them what’s going on because they didn’t call me into a meeting to tell me Kiron is not going anymore. Why is that?” she said.
O’Garro, who is currently a freshman at Monroe College in the USA, was originally named as part of a 15-member team slated to represent Antigua and Barbuda at the Carifta Games this weekend. The athlete was however de-selected by the association with news of his removal going public just two days before the team’s departure for The Bahamas.
Head coach for the Carifta team and a floor member of the Antigua and Barbuda Athletics Association, Kesswin Anthony, said the athlete was initially selected based on times he would have made during indoor meets.
“He was given some consideration based on his indoor performance. He subsequently competed outdoors and his performance outdoors was a bit off of the standard of what we were expecting him to compete at when he made that transition outdoors. In the under-20 category our standard is 48.7 and 51 seconds, 50. Or even 49 seconds, if we’re honest then we know that time is not going to get you to the finals or even the semifinals at that meet and he ran 51 seconds, so based on that fact we figured he wouldn’t be that competitive,” he said.
Anthony said the association sympathises with the athlete given the situation.
“We know it’s a young athlete we’re dealing with and we try to be as sympathetic as possible and factoring in the situation that he didn’t qualify also for the games, it was relayed to him. The [local] coach said she would speak to him as he has that type of relationship with him,” the coach said. The Carifta contingent is slated to leave for The Bahamas today.
