Basketball officials get new date for $$.
T&T Newsday Reports.
There has been another delay in the delivery of a cheque from government to the National Basketball Federation of Trinidad and Tobago (NBFTT) for payment of expenses associated with the national team.
And stand-in president of the basketball federation Kelvin Roberts is giving the assurance that the cheque to cover the outstanding debts will be ready by Wednesday next week.
After a failure by the Ministry of Sport and Youth Affairs to distribute the cheque to the NBFTT on Tuesday as promised, a meeting held on Wednesday and Roberts stated that it was because of a major mix-up which caused the delay.
However he gave the assurance that the NBFTT will definitely get the funds on Wednesday. This means that players from both the men’s and women’s basketball teams which competed at the Centro Basket Tournament in Puerto Rico last month, will have to wait yet another week for their stipends.
Newsday learnt that hotels used by the basketball federation to house the teams during the preparation for the Centro basket competition, have been calling for their bills to be settled.
In addition to stipend for players and coaches, the Basketball Federation will also have to re-imburse their former president Brian Manning approximately $30,000 which he spent out of his pocket to facilitate the team’s participation in the Centro Basket.
Roberts explained that he has already spoken to the hotels— Radix Hotel in Mayaro and Alicia’s Guest House in St Ann’s— concerning their payments.
He claimed that decisions for the teams to stay at the hotels were made by the former president of the NBFTT .
“The board was never informed or told of such arrangements for the teams to stay at the facilities and therefore we are in the dark where this is concerned,” Roberts said.
Roberts said his main focus is to pay the players and coaches their stipend, as well as payments for players who left their jobs to represent the country at the tournament.
He said Manning will only be reimbursed when bills and documents have been submitted to the NBFTT.
Roberts is expected to meet with the federation’s technical director Obadiah Asher to sort out the invoices which will be honoured when the Government cheque rolls in.
