A day after failing to mention sports in her State of the Nation Address, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo yesterday approved a budget of P220 million for the Philippine Sports Commission next year.
Budget Secretary Rolando Andaya Jr. made the announcement after emerging from the 26th board meeting of the National Economic Development Authority yesterday.
The amount is 47 percent more than the allotted P149 million for the PSC this year. It is part of the P1.227 trillion proposed budget for 2008.
Congress, however, will still deliberate on the budget, before it is finally released.
The increase is seen as a boost for the country, which will press its bid for a first-ever Olympic gold medal when the Games are held in Beijing, China next year.
After the Philippines won its first overall Southeast Asian Games title in December 2005, Arroyo directed sports officials, led by PSC chairman William Ramirez to spearhead the drive for the gold in the Olympics.
The national government allocated P108 million in 2005 and P28 million last year when Filipino athletes managed to harvest four gold medals in the Doha Asian Games.
Among the medalists was Bacoleño boxer Joan Tipon, who captured the bantamweight gold.
Three Negrenses have accounted for the last three Olympic medals.
Of the three, boxer Mansueto Velasco of Bago City came the closest to a gold when he lost a dubious one-sided match to Bulgarian Daniel Bujilov in the light flyweight finals of the Atlanta Olympics to settle for a silver.
Velasco's older brother, Roel, won a bronze in the same category during the Barcelona Games in 1992, four years after Candoni's Leopoldo Serrantes took the bronze in Seoul, Korea.
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