By Georgina Maka’a

With just over two weeks to go before the Pacific Games, local athletes are calling for justice and fairness from authorities.

In doing so, they formed a group called Solomon Islands Athletes Solidarity (SIAS) to take their issues and concerns to the sporting body.

“We want an assurance from authorities on what’s in store for participating athletes,” SIAS vice president Moses Ohai’ihi told In-depth Solomons.

“We have been disheartened by unfulfilled promises and the lack of support to prepare athletes for the games,” he added.

“We also want to hear assurance from authorities about payments after the games.

“We wanted to know how much are medal winners going to be paid, participation incentives and pre-game allowances.”

Ohai’ihi pointed out they are aware of funds being given out to federations but nothing has been given to athletes.

SIAS committee member Gianna Lepping added they also wanted to see transparency and accountability in all National Sporting Federations.

“We want proper selection of athletes, proper election of executives, and auditing to be done with reports accessible to respective athletes,” Lepping told In-depth Solomons.

A spokesperson for the National Olympics Committee of the Solomon Islands Office said the only arrangement they are aware of is the incentive the government will give to medal winners after the games.

It’s understood Solomon Islands National Institute of Sports (SINIS) has already received the first tranche of funds from the national government to support athletes two weeks ago.

Of the funds, SINIS was able to provide $100 weekly per athlete to meet their bus fares.

Many athletes say $100 a week is just not enough to prepare them for the Games.

Team Solomon is expected to go into camp at St Joseph’s Tenaru School a week before the games kick off on November 19.