POC, business tycoons, patrons form special incentive trust fund

THE Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) is teaming up with business tycoons and top sports patrons Manny V. Pangilinan (MVP), Ramon S. Ang and Charlie Gonzales of Uticon Builders, Inc. in forming a special incentive trust fund for future Filipino medalists in international meets.

POC President Abraham Tolentino said the trust fund is aimed at giving extra motivation for the national athletes who are preparing for at least two major sporting events — the Phnom Penh Southeast Asian (SEA) Games and Hangzhou Asian Games — all set next year.

The extra bonus is apart from the reward the athletes and coaches stand to receive from the government by law for snaring medals in the international arenas like the SEA Games, Asiad and Olympics.

“The POC expresses its gratitude to Mr. RSA (Ang) and Mr. MVP (Pangilinan) for their relentless and enthusiastic support to the trust fund, which is envisioned to inspire our athletes to level up further in their pursuit of victories overseas,” said Mr. Tolentino.

“It will be a very busy year for Philippine sports and, like how we did this year, the POC will again guarantee medalist athletes their incentives for them to excel even more,” he added.

The POC under the mayor from Tagaytay started rewarding cash bonuses to medalist athletes in last year’s Tokyo Olympics and last May’s Hanoi Games where the organization released a total of P11.150 million in cash bonuses to 417 athletes who harvested 52 gold, 70 silver and 105 bronze medals in Vietnam.

And that is thanks to Mr. Ang and his San Miguel group, MVP and his MVPSF and group of companies like Smart and PLDT and Mr. Gonzales’ Uticon.

He also hopes the POC special incentive trust fund program will spur private sector support to reward medalists in the SEA Games, Asian Games and Olympics.

“All donations from private corporations will automatically go to that incentive trust fund for athletes,” he said. — Joey Villar