Important Chances In Rules

For Port Moresby Games

The residential qualification for expatriates at the Third South Pacific Games in Port Moresby in 1969 is to be three years instead of two.

T:IIS was decided at a meeting of the South Pacific Games Council in Noumea on December 14. The council is the governing body for the Games.

An expatriate is defined as a per son born outside the South Pacific Islands.

A motion to increase the residential qualification to three years was moved by the Fiji delegation, and was agreed to after various other ideas had been discussed.

Papua-New Guinea wanted the two-year term retained; Tonga wanted four years; and Western Samoa five.

The aim of the motion was to ensure that expatriates were serving at least their second term in a terri tory before they became eligible to compete.

The council also decided to in crease the number of compulsory sports at the Games from three to six. A compulsory sport is one for which the host territory must pro vide the facilities for competition.

The compulsory sports for the first two Games were athletics, tennis and soccer. The three that have been added are swimming (men and women), and rugby.

Optional sports

The council decided to make judo, yachting and badminton optional sports. A proposal by New Caledonia to add equestrian events was not accepted, nor was a P-NG proposal to add shooting.

In the athletics programme, it was decided to add a pentathlon for men and women, and a 400 metres race for women. (A proposal to hold a decathlon for men was recommended after the Suva Games, but it was not staged in Noumea).

In swimming, a 200 metres medley race for men and women was added to the programme. But a move to include water polo was rejected.

On the technical side of the vari ous sports, it was decided to apply international rules.

An extremely important decision was that concerning alterations to the detailed programme of the Games.

An 80 per cent, majority of the territories in a technical committee may now change the programme, whereas previously a unanimous vote was required.

As, in the past, the detailed pro gramme was prepared by the organ ising committee of the host country, the unanimous vote requirement meant that the host country could veto a proposal by all the others— as happened, unhappily, in Noumea.

Officials elected to the Games Council for the period up to the next Games are: Mr. R. Johnstone (president), Mr. MacDonald (treasurer), and Mr. K. C. Atkinson (secretary). Mr. Atkinson’s address is: PO Box 637, Port Moresby.

Moresby programme

A couple of days after the Games Council meeting, members of the athletics technical committee met and tentatively agreed to a seven-day programme, including a one-day break, for the 1969 Games in Port Moresby. (In Noumea, the athletics events were held on four consecutive days).

The tentative programme is to hold track and field events on the first and second days, then to have a day of rest—this day being a Sunday.

On the fourth and fifth days, there will be more track and field events.

On the sixth day, some of the relays will be held, and a men’s decathlon and women’s pentathlon will begin.

The seventh day will see the end of the relays, the rest of the de cathlon and pentathlon events, and a marathon (if sufficient entries are received).

The first day’s events in the women’s pentathalon would be the 80 metres hurdles, shot put and high jump. On the second day there would be the long jump and 200 metres race.

In the men’s decathlon, the first day’s events would comprise the 100 metres, long jump, shot put, high jump and 400 metres; and on the second day there would be the 100 metres hurdles, discus, pole vault, javelin and 1,500 metres.

Delegates from the various terri tories also agreed to exchange per formance results after the territorial championships each year.