The Barbados Volleyball Association is pleading with authorities to assist with the clearance of sporting equipment that is held up in the Bridgetown Port.
This plea came from organisers during a media launch for the inaugural National Primary Schools Volleyball Invitational Competition at the Barbados Olympic Association yesterday.
First vice president of the association, Kenmore Bynoe, revealed that they currently had equipment at the port and were unable to gain access to it because of the cost of having it released.
“We have a court in the port for the last year or so incurring costs and obviously we cannot pay that cost to get it out of the port. We were trying to get the duties waived, and that has been problematic,” he said.
He explained that it has been found that when the equipment was connected to a particular educational institution the process of acquiring it was much easier.
“We have found, for instance, in the past through the Ministry of Education you can easily get those courts cleared from the port if they are directly going to a school. There is one at the Springer Memorial School that it was quite easy to get that cleared without having to pay the necessary duties because it went through the Ministry of Education”.
He pointed out it was communicated by port officials that proper documentation needed to be done before it was sent but they were unaware the equipment was being sent.
“Even though we do not pay for the court they are saying they want their duties paid. The last administration was saying that whatever you bring into the port you have to pay duties on. These were things that we were not paying for and ironically before you bring anything you have to get the documentation done before you send anything.
“Very often we would get a call that there is something in the port that the regional body has sent for you, so we could not have gotten the documentation when we didn’t know it was coming,” said Bynoe.
If help was given in clearing such equipment many more schools would have the opportunity to have courts positioned at their schools,” he said.
“We could not put any at the St Michael School because even though they have an indoor facility it is heavily used for other activities besides volleyball. They have basketball and they also have assembly there whereas at Springer their court is an exclusive volleyball court.
“If we have primary schools who are going to be actively taking part in volleyball we can beg for even more courts and get them cleared via the Ministry of Education and perhaps offer them to the winning schools. That would definitely be a tremendous incentive for the primary schools. You just have to have a place that you can put that court,” Bynoe added.
Julia Broome of Jolie B Productions, one of the hosts of the new competition, said they wanted the assistance not only for volleyball but for all sporting organisations. (RG)
