Sport and Vincentian general elections
The history of sport is inundated with claims that sport must be free from politics. However, perusal of sport practice reveals numerous instances where sport has indeed been itself political and otherwise heavily engaged in politics. The problem is that the primary advocates of the separation of sport and politics are the very ones found to be most political but who find not-so-creative ways of marketing the separation to cover their own ‘tracks’ in this regard. Evidence of this exists almost everywhere one can think of in terms of sport organisation, competition in different parts of the world. The Caribbean and Vincentian realities are no different.
The case of cricket
Cricket in the Caribbean has been a prime example of sport politics for decades. In most of the English-speaking Caribbean, cricket was the ‘sport of gentlemen’, brought to the region by the colonisers, played by them for their pleasurable pastime. History reveals that slaves and indentured servants were brought into the game to play menial roles, with little opportunity deliberately offered to systematically learn the sport. That the ‘minions’ bitterly discriminated against, learnt the craft of cricket enough to master it in any way, speaks volumes of their capacity.
The cricket clubs that got established across the anglophone Caribbean were intended for the colonisers. The International Cricket Council (ICC), headquartered in England, the motherland of that country’s colonisers, officially recognised as members across the waters, those clubs that were deemed to be in control of the sport in each island. These latter institutions were composed of mostly white players, mostly upper and middle class with access to property. They were well funded and owned their cricket facility, many of which still exist in some of the larger islands. Essentially these clubs controlled cricket in the islands of the Caribbean. Not surprisingly therefore they controlled what became known as West Indies Cricket, a reflection of the state of the region in terms of its social structure, economics and politics.
Because cricket is a team sport and was such a powerful representation of the emerging societies in the Caribbean that it became a powerful tool for the growing populations of the countries of the region to challenge the existing social and political order. The exposure of our black cricketers to professional cricket in the ‘belly of the beast’ that was England, the centre of English colonialism, allowed for the likes of Learie Constantine and CLR James to ferment the seeds of cricket becoming a force for anti-colonial struggle and ultimately birthed the Caribbean Independence movement, where and when it was least expected.
Other sports
Many of the early sports that were eventually practised and recognised in the early 20th century in the Caribbean reflected the region’s social reality. The high valued sports of tennis and cycling, for example were almost exclusively white because the. blacks could not afford the luxury of procuring their own equipment, far less meeting the expenses associated with membership. It came as no surprise that when blacks began to involve themselves in certain sports they were eventually radicalised, after years of experiencing overt and covert racial discrimination, even as the international community, including the Olympic Movement, articulated a different set of concepts in stark contradiction to contemporary practices across the world.
International sport has always and continues to be fraught with politics. While many of these organisations insist on developing constitutions that seek to make them almost immune to governmental influence the reality in practice reveals a wide range of contradictions. The IOC and the entire global sport movement stayed silent when it was revealed that former IOC President, Juan Antonio Samaranch, was associated with General Franco’s Fascist regime in Spain. Andrew Jennings, author of an authoritative critique of international sport, The Lords of the Rings (1992), in a piece carried (https://amateursport.wordpress.com/2010/04/22/) on 22 April 2010, stated in part, “Samaranch was the great survivor. Probably the last of his generation of European fascist politicians to remain active in public life, Samaranch reinvented himself to the degree that his supporters proposed him as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize…. In the last years of the dictatorship, Samaranch was appointed political chief of Catalonia, wearing fascist uniform and giving the right-arm salute until Franco’s death in 1975. As late as 1971 he told a local paper: “I’m a man loyal to all that Franco represents. I’m a man of the Movimiento and of course I’m going to remain loyal for the rest of my life.”
Samaranch got into the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 1966 and became its president in 1980. His leadership has been credited with the economic transformation of the organisation, in large measure, from his decision to open the Olympics to professional athletes. But some may suggest that his tenure was also characterised by repeated claims of increased use of drugs in sport, including at the Games, and corruption in the ranks of the leadership of the institution.
Samaranch, and his successors at the head of the IOC, have often been critically associated with a seeming penchant to play politics with and in sport while claiming otherwise. The most recent of former IOC Presidents, Thomas Bach, of Germany, has been seen as a sort of master international politician.
St Vincent and the Grenadines
Over time, with the growth of populations in Caribbean countries and the dynamics of increasing access to education and international exposure, it became good politics for politicians and national governments to engage themselves in the utilisation of sport to garner votes in general elections. This latter reality has never changed and has become a mainstay in national politics across the Caribbean as much as other forms of sport patronage.
While it is not commonplace in the Caribbean for sports personnel to be directly associated with party politics, there is evidence that this has occurred in some of the nations of the region.
In some countries, politics and sport have been bedfellows for a very long time.
In the case of St Vincent and the Grenadines, it is clear that the politicians have seen sport as a pathway to garnering the votes of the young people. This cohort is deemed particularly important since the people involved are generally new to politics as emerging adults and not necessarily heavily influenced by the voting patterns of their parents and elders.
The location of sports facilities around the country has been heavily influenced by the perception by politicians of different political parties in government. Rather than engage national sports associations to determine precise needs and an understanding of the state of the different sports in the country, politicians look at constituencies and locate sporting infrastructure where they believe votes can be had.
Generally, the more influential the politician with the ruling party the more likely the sport infrastructure is developed in his/her constituency.
One has only to examine the sporadic development of sport facilities under the ambit of the National Lotteries Authority (NLA) as opposed to those under the National Sports Council, under the current administration to understand and appreciate the ruling regime’s politics and sport programme. This is particularly significant when one understands that there is in place a Sports Council (NSC) Act which locates a mandate for sports facilities under that institution. The difference between the sport infrastructure under the NSC (except the Arnos Vale Cricket facilities) with those under the NLA, is extremely disparate. Those constructed by the NLA are fenced, properly maintained, lit and provided with security. Access has to be officially requested.
How the decision is made as to which sport facilities are funded by the central government and which by the NLA remains unclear to the Vincentian public.
A National Stadium Committee was established and reviewed and is still in existence after more than two decades, yet the current stadium structure at Diamond, still under construction and with no definitive completion date, is located under the Ministry of Planning, with no direct relationship with the former institution. It was hastily opened a few days before the general elections of 2020. It is interesting that the stadium has not been placed under any of the existing bodies mandated to construct and manage government’s sport facilities.
In 2015, some may recall that the NLA had borrowed some $6m from the National Insurance Services, ostensibly, for the upgrading of sports facilities. However, the loan came even as the country was getting into a general elections mode. Precisely which sport facilities benefitted from the application of the loan funds and in what ways, may still be a story worth telling.
There is also the perennial challenge of knowing and understanding the process of national sports associations being able to access funding from the NLA. The norm is that the national sport bodies must apply to the NSC, and the latter will determine its recommendation and then forwards its decision to the NLA for consideration. However, the association is then expected to follow-up, not with the NSC which made a decision and recommendation to the NLA, but with the latter organisation.
The recent furore over the hastily put together Independence Cricket Festival stands out as a major anomaly and stands in stark contradiction to all pertinent sport norms. The politics involved were and are particularly clear. The announcement that this phenomenon would be an annual event remains to be seen since its continuance does not rely solely on the party in power.
The case of the government’s very late response to more than two years of seeking assistance is another fine example of the politics that impact sport in this country. It is difficult to ignore the government’s perceived ‘blind eye’ to Kineke Alexander’s persistent communication and visits to the Prime Minister and the frequent run around that forced into frustration. Her achievements in her sport at the NCAA, regional and continental levels are an important part of our country’s history.
Of course, Shafiqua Maloney was much more fortunate than Alexander. Some suggest that it was the region-wide embarrassment resulting from her viral Sportsmax interview in 2024 that made the difference. The reality is that the latter interview was not her first appeal for help from the government. There is a story to tell about her earlier adventures in seeking an audience and receiving responses to her numerous appeals.
Of no less importance and relevance is the tardiness in arriving at a decision to offer Adonal Foyle the status if Sport Ambassador for this country.
The problem is that in an election year, the political intervention in sport reaches something of a critical climax. This is because the youth vote is seen as ‘virgin’ and likely to tip the scales of electoral victory.
In this political guava season, with general elections pending, the sportspeople of St Vincent and the Grenadines are once more critically important electoral pawns.
