MANILA – The Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (SBP), which leads the Philippines' local organizing committee (LOC) for the FIBA World Cup, organized a Detailed Planning Workshop last weekend at the Quest Plus Conference Center in Mabalacat, Pampanga.
The workshop, the third of a series of five meetings, was mainly about the current updates on the Philippines' part in co-hosting the said event along with Japan and Indonesia from Aug. 25 to Sept. 10, 2023.
The Philippines serves as the main host of the tri-nation hosting.
The heads of the committees formed for the Philippine hosting, those in charge of the draw ceremony in April, venues, transportation, accreditation and games services to information technology (IT) and telecommunication, protocol and international relations, human resources, volunteer program, safety and security, finance, and medical and doping control, presented their reports on the first day.
On the other hand, the Joint Management Committee and the chiefs of departments handling ways and means, broadcast and media, the World Congress, games services and sport/ competition presented their own updates on the final day of the event.
“I think now that the different departments realize that very detailed planning is important for this event, like transportation schedule, catering plan, ID plan and the venue drawings, spaces, among others, everything is falling into place,” Tats Suzara said.
The volleyball chief has been named the Philippine LOC master planner for the FIBA World Cup and served as the moderator of the planning workshop.
Meanwhile, FIBA World Cup executive director David Crocker was impressed at how the workshop went, especially during Day 1.
“I like the front of the session because it’s all about team-building,” said Crocker, who also contributed his inputs in Day 2, especially on the broadcasting and media tribune to be set up and in the function of volunteer services. “With 308 days to go, it’s really time for all these functional areas to start coming together, not only as individual areas of expertise but to be working across the functional areas in some level of cooperation and harmony. To see the efforts in trying to break down the barriers and make sure that all the teams know each other and find ways to work together is really an important step in the way the teams work.”
SBP executive director Sonny Barrios stressed the importance of having workshops like this.
“Malaking bagay din ‘to kasi nasa-summarize sa karamihan yung nagagawa ng bawat grupo para aware ka, kung functional area A head ka, aware ka kung ano nangyayari kay B (This is a big deal because the output of each group is being summarized for you to be aware, for example, if you're the functional A head, you're aware about what's happening to B) and vice versa,” he said.
Meanwhile, he hopes that the IT situation will improve after expressing concern on providing strong internet connection in the arenas and the other venues to be used for the FIBA World Cup hosting.
“I cannot over-emphasize this. Meron kasi tayong mga must-have [like strong internet signal in the venues], and meron din tayong mga nice-to-have [like wifi in the team bus]. Ang importante, focused tayo sa must-have dahil baka meron nga tayong mga nice-to-have pero sa must-have naman tayo sumasablay (We have must-haves like strong internet signal in the venues and also nice-to-haves like wifi in the team bus. The important thing is that we should be focused on the must-haves because we might already have nice-to-haves but it is in the must-haves where we're having problems),” Barrios added. (PNA)
