THE fate of the Mindanao leg of the Chooks-to-Go Pilipinas VisMin Super Cup remains hanging in the air, for now.
Despite the appeal for reconsideration last week of Chooks-to-Go president and sports patron Ronald Mascariñas, whose firm is sponsoring the new pro league, Games and Amusements Board chairman Baham Mitra insisted yesterday the VisMin Cup is under reevaluation.
“For reevaluation ang league,” Mitra told Malaya-Business Insight. “We would not want a sponsor to influence our decisions and our duty to protect integrity in sports.”
In its website, the GAB’s function is to “regulate(s) and supervise professional sports and allied activities to combat and prevent the existence and proliferation of illegal bookie joints and other forms of organized illegal gambling connected with all play-for-pay sports and amusement games.”
Nowhere does it say that the GAB is empowered to suspend any league.
Mascariñas has threatened to pull out his company’s backing of the pro league mired in controversy after two teams — Siquijor and ARQ Builders-Lapu Lapu City — figured in a mockery of a match last April 14 that raised suspicions of game-fixing.
Mascariñas, who grew up in Butuan City, sees the VisMin Cup as a glimmer of hope for players in the Visayas and Mindanao regions to prove their worth.
Mitra said putting the Mindanao leg on hold is a precautionary measure.
“Wala kaming nakukuha na appeal letter. We are waiting for the conclusion of the Visayas leg and full completion of the requirements,” Mitra said. “How can we approve something na wala pang submitted na line-ups and all? Baka mamaya maulit.”
In a travesty of the sport so dear to Filipinos, players muffed free throws and botched open lay-ups, with the Heroes’ Rendell Senining shooting free throws with his left and right hand on separate occasions, both of which he badly missed.
