Joseph Parker and Maria Tutaia Ambassadors of Sports award

By Deidre Fanene 10 November 2016, 12:00AM

The Vailima Sports Awards powered by Leadership Samoa 2015 has confirmed two of their Ambassadors who will be at the event on 17 December 2016.

They are heavyweight boxer Lupesoliai Laauliolemalietoa Joseph Parker and Silver Fern shooter Maria Tutaia.

Leadership Samoa Spokesperson, Sioeli Alofaifo, told the Samoa Observer the two athletes were chosen by their class in the beginning.

“When our event was launched this year in April these two sent their videos to congratulate us on our launch,” he said.

“We believe that having Lupesolai Joseph Parker and Maria Tutaia as our ambassadors will help motivate the young athletes of Samoa.”

Mr. Alofaifo went on to say that they are still in contact with them with regards to the logistics.

“For everyone’s information the date for our award was set on the 10th of December however this is the same date as Lupesoliai Joseph Parker’s fight,” he said.

“So as one of our ambassadors our group agreed to push our award to the following week on the 17th but to pay our respect to Lupesoliai as he is one of our ambassadors for our awards.

“We have sent them the confirmed date of the event so we will confirm everything else by the end of the month.

“We are also hoping to get more Samoan athletes who are playing for overseas teams to encourage and acknowledge our athletes here.”

Mr. Alofaifo emphasised the importance of having famous Samoan athletes present at the awards.

“This is all for our athletes and to have people like Maria and Lupesoliai present at the award will motivate our athletes to keep doing what they do and what they love,” the spokesperson said.

Speaking of the event the spokespersons said the award is divided into 12 categories.

“We have 12 different awards on the night and all of them have prize money,” he said.

“The largest amount of prize money is $5,000tala and the smallest one is $1,500tala. These are small incentives to attract and motivate our athletes.

“We are also hoping to hold this event annually to help our athletes.”

The event is only from the period of November 1st last year till the 31st of October this year.

 

AWARD CATEGORIES:

1) Vailima Overall Sportsperson of the Year

2) Bank of South Pacific Empowered Athlete with a Disability of the Year

3) Samoa Observer Lifetime Achievement Award

4) Team of the Year

5) Sports Administrator of the Year

6) Sports Manager of the Year

7) Coach of the Year

8) Senior Sportsman of the Year

9) Senior Sportswoman of the Year

10) Junior Sportsman of the Year

11) Senior Sportswoman of the Year

12) Sports Organization/Body of the Year

By Deidre Fanene 10 November 2016, 12:00AM
Samoa Observer

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