West Indies: All hands on deck

Concerned by the rapid decline in West Indies cricket, the 'stakeholders' of the game will try to find a solution to the flagging fortunes in a major conference over the next 2 1/2 months.

The unprecedented exchange of ideas, the brainchild of CARICOM and the University of the West Indies (UWI), starts on Wednesday and culminates with a plenary session on June 1 and 2 at the UWI's Cave Hill Campus.

'Since we as a people have made our greatest cultural investment in cricket and since cricket has never been a stand-alone game, we have good reasons to be concerned,' Professor Hilary Beckles said at yesterday's launching at the Cave Hill Campus.

'There is a sense of distress and despair.

'What will be the strategic response of West Indian people'

'What will be the strategic response of the stakeholder of the West Indian game'

'Can all of the stakeholders find the answer'' Beckles asked during the Press conference, which was aired on regional television stations.

The first objective of the conference is to find a way to propel West Indies cricket into the post-modern technical and scientific world while strengthening its specific West Indian socio-cultural values and roots.

The second objective will be to launch a long-term programme of culturally preparing the region for the 2007 World Cup.

The conference will be designed as a regional, multi-media, multi-layered public discourse involving all Caribbean stakeholders who will interface at three levels using multi-media technology.

Those identified among the stakeholders are players, former players, managers, coaches, selectors, sponsors, advertisers, financial investors, media, educators, governments, supportive non-governmental organisations, spectators and the public.

Information gathered from national consultations will be brought to the plenary session where stakeholder representatives will meet in a workshop format in order to produce a strategic plan for sustaining West Indies cricket culture and facilitating improvement in player performances.

Principal Sir Keith Hunte said the UWI was pleased to place resources at the disposal of the regional community in response to the sense of direction given by CARICOM.

'We are satisfied that nothing but good can come out of constructive rounds of discussions which will seek not just to attribute blame, but to rebuild and to strengthen the foundations and look ahead,' he said.

CARICOM Secretary-General Edwin Carrington described the conference as a very strategic moment in the history of the development of West Indies cricket.

'Cricket has been the primary leader in the integration of our region,' he said.

'We do not have all the answers, but we believe that if together the people across the region can put their heads together, we believe once again West Indies cricket can rise to the level of excellence which is of very recent memory to so many of us.'

Barbados Cricket Association second vice-president Owen Estwick, speaking on behalf of the West Indies Cricket Board, said it was a happy co-incidence that the three most significant institutions in the region could come together in such a venture.

'We hope that it will be a permanent partnership in furtherance of the continued development of West Indies cricket at a time when we all know that the game needs every support.'