Shelved two years in a row, competitions in the Batang Pinoy Games and the Philippine National Games (PNG) can possibly resume within the year.
Philippine Sports Institute national training director Marc Edward Velasco said plans are afoot to revive the holding of these two Games vital to the grassroots development program of the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC).
“We will be jump-starting our grassroots programs. The Batang Pinoy program will start to do some coordination, although we cannot say if we can have a Batang Pinoy this year,’’ said Velasco.
“Our committee for Batang Pinoy will be able to come up and coordinate with our local government units. Hopefully when everything goes well, we’ll be able to go full blast with the program,’’ added Velasco, the concurrent PSC chief of staff.
The ongoing COVID-19 health crisis has put the Batang Pinoy, the national sports youth competition for athletes under 15 years old, on hold since 2020.
The last Batang Pinoy Championships was held in 2019 in Puerto Princesa City, Palawan.
The pandemic likewise didn’t spare the annual staging of the PNG, the platform where the best athletes in the land from mostly all sports are featured.
“For the past two years, there were no major competitions. But it’s in the pipeline and we have to be optimistically cautious,’’ said Velasco.