Abusive school coaches should be sacked
Sri Lanka should be ashamed of how its schoolboys and girls are treated by coaches as exposed by the Sunday Observer last week and it has only resulted in tarnishing the name of a leading school who employed such an abusive coach for its rugby team.
This is a lesson for all schools that should immediately screen their coaches in all sports and get rid of those with an abusive nature and history.
This kind of conduct where a coach had assaulted a schoolboy rugby player can in no way be tolerated by a civilized society especially for a school which has a clean image and reputation with regard to discipline.
Now that Sri Lanka Rugby has followed the orders of the World Rugby governing body and suspended the coach from coaching the school authorities too should act now and see to it that no coach in the present or future will be able to assault someone’s child and get away.
There is enough reason for the parents of the boy who was assaulted to file a court case and claim damages as there is plenty of evidence on video. Salutes should go to the social media activist who shot that video and put it on the internet.
This should serve as a deterrent for all coaches in the country that even if they do this behind closed doors or away from a camera, their conduct cannot be tolerated in a civilized country or in a country trying to keep abreast with other countries with good human rights records.
Also it is high time that a code of conduct be implemented to hold coaches responsible for their conduct and schoolboys be allowed to be brought up by leaning things the right way without coming under assault and leaving school as angry young men.
I also appeal to all schools to lay down the Code for their coaches in all sports.
Rory Silva
Bambalapitiya
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Democracy wins at cricket election
At least Sri Lanka will now be looked upon as a country that does not practice hypocrisy (or am I wrong) after it held the long overdue election of office-bearers to Sri Lanka Cricket.
It was hypocritical for Sri Lanka that talks about democracy and on the other hand cancel an election of office bearers of a sports organization.
Just because some people cannot muster the required number of votes to win, it was not fair to keep out those that the clubs and associations want as their office bearers to run cricket in the country.
May this madness or hypocrisy of installing so-called interim committees to run cricket end from now on and let the clubs and associations that are members of Sri Lanka Cricket be allowed to elect whom they want and let no one violate their voting rights.
Above all, let’s not practice Hypocrisy.
Arthur DM Pereira
Negombo