POC prioritizes hiring of top foreign coaches

THE PHILIPPINE Olympic Committee is keen on hiring more foreign coaches to train Filipino athletes.

POC president Jose “Peping” Cojuangco Jr. said he would soon sit down with Philippine Sports Commission officials to address the need to hire more quality coaches overseas.

The local Olympic chief said the pay foreign coaches normally receive should be upgraded to encourage the best of them to come over.

“We have to change the regulation so we could get better coaches,” said Cojuangco.

Under PSC rules, the maximum basic salary of a foreign coach is $1,500 per month.

PSC chair Richie Garcia himself said the pay should not go lower than $2,000 to at least entice a Class B coach. He said the PSC would realign the budget intended for priority athletes so NSAs could get better coaches.

Except for the track and field medalists in the last Southeast Asian Games, the majority of the 145 priority athletes refused to avail themselves of the PSC’s offer that they serve as full-time athletes with a salary of P40,000.

Archery recently hired Korean coach Chung Jae-hun, the 1992 Barcelona Olympics silver medalist, who helped the national archers Mark Javier and Rachel Ann Cabral land Olympic spots in London through the recent World Archery Championships in Utah.

Badminton also hired Indonesian Rexy Mainaky, a doubles gold medalist in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.