We haven’t heard a lot about them in Belize for the last two
decades or so, but FIBA is the governing body of basketball worldwide, from
the NBA in the United States to the inter-office league in Belize City –
everyone plays by FIBA’s rules. And now the Secretary General of FIBA
Americas, Alberto Garcia is in Belize. He’s in the senior ranks of FIBA,
so for the basketball fraternity his visit is important for both practical and
symbolic reasons. And he’s visiting simply because he’s impressed
with the energy and focus of the new executive of the Belize Basketball Federation.
He says they’ve been flooding his inbox with e-mails, the first time he’s
seen anything like that from Belize in twenty years.
Alberto Garcia, FIBA Sec. Gen.
“The first time in the life we received some request from the National
Federation in 20 to 23 years ago. For that I appreciate that the invitation
for coming to Belize and I hope that my visit and my proposal for the national
federation can help Belize’s development of basketball in the future.”
Jules Vasquez,
We know that we have commitment, dedication, involvement but finance sources
are an important part.
Alberto Garcia,
“Yeah but there are things we can do without money. The money is very
important to do some things but other things we don’t need money, we only
need persons with love for our sport, love for our issues in different stages,
and FIBA has to compromise with the national federation to help, to improve
the basketball in the future. We think about the future, not about tomorrow
or after tomorrow. We need to start today because we need one excellent national
team in our competition in 2012-2014 and we need to think about 2014. We need
to start today with the kids.”
Yesterday Garcia met with Sports Minister Elvin Penner. He has also
toured basketball facilities countrywide. He is the most senior FIBA official
ever to visit Belize.
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