ATHLETES FINALLY GET ALLOWANCES FROM MINISTRY

After six months of forming new athletic pools the Sports Ministry finally distributed financial allowances to 27 athletes and 20 coaches at the Sports Ministry yesterday.

Sports Minister Dayasiri Jayasekara said the payments will continue monthly from this month onwards. Although athletic pools were formed in October last year for the Asian Championship, they won’t be getting allowances from October 2016 to February 2017.

According to the pools, Olympian marathoner Anuradha Indrajith Cooray is the only one in the super pool who will receive Rs, 75,000 monthly while there are 14 athletes in the elite pool who will receive Rs.30, 000 monthly. The junior pool comprising of 12 athletes will receive Rs.15, 000 monthly. Apart from that, athletes who won’t be using Sports Ministry Pools for their food will get an extra allowance of Rs. 5000.

Minister Jayasekara had directed the Athletics Association of Sri Lanka to pool their athletes just after the South Asian Games last year, promising them many facilities including monthly financial allowances for their expenses as well as an expert foreign training program. The promises were not honoured all these months but suddenly with just three months to go for the Asian Championship the Minister has begun to give the allowances to these deserving athletes.

On top of that Sugathadasa Stadium is still to be renovated though Minister Jayasekara claimed he financed the patch work to be done on Diyagama Stadium which is yet to be completed. The forthcoming National Athletics trails are to be conducted at Diyagama.

Sports minister has pledged a budget allocated to building five new tracks in five Provinces around the country.

Minister also promised that selected athletes from the April trails would be sent to India for further training as Sri Lanka does not have a proper track for training. He is optimistic about getting at least one local synthetic track ready by May this year.