Source: www.guardian.co.tt
By: Andrew Gioannetti
Scotiabank Trinidad and Tobago Limited and the T&T Olympic Committee (T&TOC) have engaged in a $600,000 four year Olympic Patrnership, exactly one year prior to the commencement of the 2012 London Olympic Games. The merger of the financial institution and the T&TOC was formally announced at a media launch held at the Scotiabank Hospitality Suite, Queen’s Park Oval, Port-of-Spain, yesterday. The function was attended by Managing Director of Scotiabank T&T Limited, Richard Young; President of the T&TOC, Larry Romany; T&TOC Secretary General, Brian Lewis; T&T sprinter Emmanuel Callender, Driselle Ramjohn, Manager, Public & Corporate Affairs for Scotiabank T&T; among others. According to Young, the initiative to join in partnership with the T&TOC, is another way in which the institution shared support through its programmes in sport and by other means. “It is really a strategic partnership which will allow the bank to lend support to local athletes who will be representing T&T at the upcoming Olympics.
He, however, continued saying: “While we support competitive athletes, the partnership was fundamentally born out of a common objective that the T&TOC have and one that we (Scotiabank) have in a foundation, the Scotia Bright Future Programme, and that really centres around what we started four years ago, to promote young people so that they can have a brighter future.” In response, head of the T&TOC, Romany in his address lauded Scotiabank’s initiatives and indicated that the bank has been the ideal partner in terms of standards and values which are shown in initiatives. “The T&TOC within the last 16 years have set out to select a partner. I use that word because that is exactly what we have done. The T&TOC does not have a lot of social partners and that is because we actually go out and select partners that have the same values that we have... that want the same thing.” On the topic of sponsorship of the sporting committees and local athletes, Romany noted that despite medal earning performances by T&T athletes within the past few Olympic Games, from resources available, T&T should have the standard of medal winning athletes more on par of the likes of Jamaica, which he said, has possibly a very limited budget allocated for sport, perhaps in comparison to the number of medal winning athletes that the country produces. “One of the things that you would notice is that compared to Jamaica, we are still not at the level of medal winning capacity, and one would think that there are proportional rate of resources to medals.”
He, however, continued to stress his gratitude to Scotiabank T&T, while reiterating his pleasure in partnering with an institution which has a similar track record in terms of values. “We are very happy today to have this partnership with Scotiabank. We think that they understand what we are about and we are convinced that they would make an excellent partner. Their brand is strong, the Olympic brand is strong, our values are the same and we look forward to working together in all the programmes that we have in order to ensure success.”