Lahari says organisation in process of setting up Gulf base

By MELTON PAIS
Gulf Provincial Sports Trust (GPST) chief executive Lawrence Lahari says they are in the process of establishing a “home” in the province.
Lahari made the remarks in response to concerns raised by a member of the province’s sporting fraternity over the whereabouts of the GPST office.
“GPST will have an office in Kerema at the Gulf government headquarters for sporting bodies to come and see,” he said.
Lahari said at the moment, GPST was located on the eighth floor of MRDC building and also at the Bava precinct.
“As per funding, we don’t have any at the moment from the provincial government and are currently working with key stakeholders as per our business plan we launched,” he said.
Lahari said GPST was launched on April 12 to coordinate and manage all sporting programmes, activities, policies and facilities in Gulf.
“If any Gulf sports would like to contact the GPST, you can through [email protected],” he said.
“We intend to build our own facility for our professional teams, so the likes of the Isou and Erema can host matches in Gulf. We also have plans to build basketball, netball, volleyball courts and facilities for athletics.
“Our business plan sets out our pathways, spanning from athlete development to playing fields for each sport, junior development programmes and sports administration at levels.
“As in all development programmes and plans, these goals take time to plan, finance, implement and maintain.”
Lahari said funding had been limited since GPST’s launching.
He said GPST had been supporting the Isou and Erema, who won the Champions League in the Football Federation of Papua New Guinea earlier this year and were now preparing for next season.