PH as Olympics host? Why not, says Golez

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines as host of the 2024 Olympics?

It could happen, said former Parañaque City Rep. Roilo Golez, a champion boxer in his student days and former president of the Philippine Olympic Academy.

Golez said the Philippines should dream big and work doubly hard to vie for the privilege of hosting the Summer Olympics 20 years from now.

He said this was not impossible since it was achieved by South Korea, which won the bid to host the 1988 Olympics in 1980. He said South Korea from the 1970s to the 1980s was a rising economy just like the Philippines.

The Philippines, he said, was even more progressive than South Korea in the 1970s since at the time it already had a 10-year-old shipyard in Nassco in Mariveles, Bataan, while South Korea was just starting to build ships.

“Seoul hosted the 1988 Olympics, winning the bid around 1980 when South Korea was just a rising economy. In 1972, the Philippines and South Korea were at around the same level of economic development. We already had a shipyard constructing interisland ships. Hyundai Shipbuilding of Korea had its groundbreaking only in 1972. We were already assembling cars way before with Ysmael’s Fiat, DMG’s Volkswagen and the Progressive Car Manufacturing Program when South Korea virtually had no domestic car industry,” Golez said.

South Korea, said Golez, dreamed big as a nation and worked hard to achieve economic development in the decade before it made a pitch to host the Olympics.

He said the Philippines could duplicate that achievement since it is currently in a better position than South Korea was in the 1970s.

He said working to host the Olympics may be the catalyst the Philippines needs to achieve economic development.

“In the process of working for that Olympic dream, they (South Koreans) worked to dramatically improve their infrastructure, energy, social amenities, communications, etc., to become worthy of consideration to host the Olympics.