LEADERS MAKE TOUGH DECISIONS.
Fidel Castro put Uncle Sam out of Cuba as if the United States was the media at the scene of a homicide.
Erskine Sandiford once told a whole group of civil servants he was bringing the sickle and never once stepped foot in a cane field.
Someone at KFC did away with the Whattadeal.
I even disciplined 20 campers aged six to 16 by keeping them indoors for an entire day when the sun was out.
“Oh, the injustice,” I can hear all now.
So take solace, Carlos Moore, in knowing that men before you have lived through such choices. [Though, like you, I’m wondering how that guy from the Colonel has managed to do it.]
Not that failing to seek a second term at the helm of local basketball really falls into the “tough” category.
Look at it this way, though, you shouldn’t expect an unfavourable response when you decide to do it.
I know, I know, you’ll tell me that this hasn’t been the M.O. for your time in office.
You’ll remind me about the Premier League expansion, your executive’s decision to increase the number of top-flight teams from eight to a gaudy 12 in just your first couple of days in office.
Yeah, you’ll say how tough it was to pull the trigger on promoting three teams when everyone was already complaining about the league’s mediocre standards.
And how easy it would have been for people to unfairly cry nepotism considering three of your council members hold lofty positions with those clubs in question.
No doubting the complexity of your choice there.
You’ll probably recall just two weeks ago that you decided against showing any interest for the National Sports Council’s grand awards ceremony.
It would’ve been the customary practice to hold your association’s annual general meeting on any date other than local sport’s biggest night, considering your association’s financial ties with the host.
But you went the difficult route of allowing the two events to clash anyhow, even as your council seeks assistance for future overseas tours.
Can’t dispute the intricacy of that decision.
Then again it wasn’t an easy 2010 for you now, was it?
You’ll jog my memory about how a guy named Rodney Ollivierre approached you about generating some funds for your cash-strapped association via a fail-safe but relatively huge raffle.
I know several people warned you about the difficulty of trying to raffle a house and car worth $480 000 to the basketball public during the offseason.
You might even enlighten me about the advice you were given on how improbable it was for the executive to turn a profit on holding a draw of this size just three months after starting it.
And you’ll most likely say how tough it was for you to do it anyhow.
Must’ve been equally hard to write that email to the general body later in December notifying them of the raffle’s abandonment for what seems to be a shocking “lack of support”.
I can’t even imagine how daunting it was for you to face my questions surrounding the amount of money the executive owes following the raffle fallout.
We know tough challenges don’t faze you though.
It’s your nature.
From the time you came to basketball prominence it was just one difficult situation after another.
You lost the 2007 election for the top post and still found it within yourself to accept a lesser vice-presidential role.
Eighteen months later you truly began to feel your function was being marginalised and instead of frustrating the process you took the hard stance of resigning.
It’s not as if you went into hiding either.
Only six months later you returned to contest the presidency again, knowing full well you could face the public’s scrutiny for abandoning a smaller post only to seek a greater one.
Now another difficult choice awaits you.
And though failing to return as president might not seem that tough to you, I’m advising you to go in that direction.
Because if left up to the general body at the polls, they won’t see it as a tough decision to make either.
• Justin Marville is a NATION reporter and may be reached at justinmarville@nationnews.com
