Untangle Obiena case

When the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) maneuvered a mediation to settle the controversy involving pole-vaulter EJ Obiena and the Philippines Athletics Track and Field Association (Patafa), there was optimism for a speedy resolution to the rift that has polarized Philippine sports for the past four months or so.

But the process has dragged on and looks nowhere near a satisfying conclusion.

One of the biggest disputes to rock Philippine sports of late started when the Patafa, alerted to a potentially illegal set of liquidation papers, tells Obiena in a letter that it was handing over his documents to the Commission on Audit (COA) for scrutiny. Usually, the COA pores over the submitted reports and determines if fraud has been committed. If so, it determines the extent of culpability and the necessary sanctions, which it then transmits to the Patafa for action. If nothing irregular is discovered, Patafa apologizes profusely to Obiena for the inconvenience and moves on.

Instead, the process was jumbled. The Patafa said it found discrepancies in the financial reports Obiena had submitted, accused the athlete of misappropriating training funds, and issued a strongly worded memo that left no doubt it had made up its mind over the matter. When the world got wind of the story, everything blew up even before the COA began probing Obiena’s financial statements.

In the resulting chaos, both parties seem to be hiding behind their respective safe spaces.

The Patafa is using the ongoing mediation as an excuse to defer any decision on Obiena’s request to be endorsed to international meets. The deferment has already cost Obiena a chance to flaunt his skills in Serbia where, despite currently being ranked fifth in the world, he won’t be competing for the gold. In a statement sent to the media, Patafa said the deferral was “consistent with the directive of the Senate Committee to undergo mediation.”

What the statement left unsaid could be telling: The Patafa, as a sign of good faith, can actually issue an endorsement for Obiena even with the ongoing mediation. There is no legal impediment at all. The moral impediment is a gray area, but it would be safe to say no one is going to misconstrue a temporary pass issued to Obiena, so he can represent the country in overseas meets as something to be called out.

Obiena has an even safer shelter: behind the Philippine flag. The Tokyo Olympian has managed to gain public sympathy by harking on the opportunities the country has missed because of the controversy. The Patafa has already left the Asian record holder off its Southeast Asian Games team (again using the ongoing mediation as an excuse). Its stand on deferring any endorsement until after the PSC mediation has so far cost Obiena a spot in the world championships in Belgrade.

Obiena has also turned the Patafa’s processes against itself — why did the federation foist the tedious paperwork and accounting chores on a national athlete training thousands of miles from home to bring glory to the country?

There is no reason for Obiena to give up the flag-waving, considering how he had missed his chance at cementing his spot in the pantheon of Philippine sports. But the Patafa won’t budge either. Along whisper corridors travels its fear that, by allowing Obiena to get away with the alleged fraudulent papers, it would help calcify the idea that the local sports bureaucracy runs on two tracks: one for gold medal hopefuls, and another for those stuck way below global standards of excellence.

The Philippine Olympic Committee can merely go as far as finding workarounds to get Obiena to compete without the Patafa’s endorsement. It did try to circumvent that need by suspending the Patafa and putting national athletes under its supervision. But that does not in any way guarantee that Patafa would stop probing allegations of misappropriated funds and fraudulent liquidation reports against Obiena.

The only way to untangle this current knot is for the PSC to speed up its mediation process, or unveil the result of the state auditors’ scrutiny of Obiena’s documents. If that result isn’t out yet, the PSC should knock on COA’s doors frantically. The COA, really, has a simple question to answer: Obiena has admitted to being behind in his payments to his coach several times; did he submit liquidation papers that say otherwise?