In an unfortunate development earlier this week, Filipino pole vaulter EJ Obiena skipped the Asian Indoor Championships in Kazakhstan due to financial and logistics problems. On his Facebook, the Olympian said his team and the Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association (PATAFA) were unable to bring his poles to Astana.
That was only the logistics part. Understandably, more Filipinos sympathized with the other half of the problem: money. In the same Facebook post, Obiena said that his team has yet to receive their salaries, supposedly funded by the national government, in over year.
Filipinos, displaying the Bayanihan spirit, apparently reached out to Obiena to help finance his team’s needs. Logic dictates what would have happened next is this: the person who needs money would accept donations to make up for that lack.
But EJ Obiena went the other route.
And his explanation was a lesson not just in sports, but taxes, governance, and integrity, too.
“I am a national athlete and my expenses have been approved for payment by the [Philippine Sports Commission] and funded from taxpayer revenues,” Obiena wrote in his social media page.
“As all of you are taxpayers, I must respect that you have already paid for my training.”
The SEA Games gold medalist elaborated why it’s wrong for him to take donations.
“It is just not the right thing to do to ask you to pay once via paying taxes, and then pay again privately. This is 'double dipping' and it’s not ethical,” Obiena explained.
The pole vaulter also said that “a team of people” is now addressing the issue, and that he would “allow some time” for it to be resolved.
On Wednesday, PSC Commissioner Richard Bachman said in a statement “they have taken steps in the PSC to resolve all issues immediately.”
“We continue to strive to give the best support to our elite athletes,” Bachmann added.