The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

BAHAMAS Olympic Committee (BOC) president Wellington Miller has been summoned to Gibraltar this weekend where the Commonwealth Games Federation will announce whether or not the Bahamas has been granted the rights to host the Commonwealth Youth Games in 2017.

The Bahamas put in a bid to host the games July 17-24, 2017 after St Lucia, given the original bid in November 2011, had indicated that they were not in a position to hold the event anymore because of financial constraints.

Two weeks ago, the BOC put together a team, led by Grafton Ifill, to conduct a series of meetings with Louise Martin, president of the Commonwealth Games Federation and Rachel Simon, coordinator of the Commonwealth Youth Games, here in the Bahamas.

The meetings were to provide an overall view of the Bahamas’ capabilities of hosting the games, which are expected to feature more than 1,000 athletes between the ages of 14-18 from 70-plus countries participating in 7-8 different sporting disciplines.

Miller, who will be making the trek by himself, is scheduled to leave on Thursday for the meeting set for January 29-30.

“I’m hoping that the news will be very good, considering that I have to travel so far,” Miller said. “I’m very confident that we will get the nomination because we did a very good job selling the Bahamas to Mrs Martin and Mrs Simon when they came here for the site inspection. We left them spell bound during their visit. Grafton Ifill did a fantastic job in leading the committee that did all of the necessary work. We have to give him a lot of credit for the job that he did.”

Miller said they also had a series of meetings to deal with the accommodations, transportation, security and travel. He noted that even Prime Minister Perry Christie made a pitch to the visitors to help to convince the Commonwealth Games Federation to consider the Bahamas as the ultimate choice in 2017.

“I’m hoping that when I come back, I will bring some good news with me,” Miller said.

During the site inspection, Martin said she was overwhelmed by what she experienced. “From the Prime Minister right down to your youth and sports minister and everybody else we have had to deal with, we have had some very good responses,” Martin said. “We want to make this an educational and cultural experience for these young athletes because the majority of them may never ever get a chance to come back here again if the games are hosted here.

“Yes, they will be competing, don’t get me wrong, but that’s not the only reason why we host these games. This is something special for the young people and that is what the games is all about. But we still have a long way to go in making the final decision. So we are here to make sure that everything is tight and we have all the answers to everything that we need.”