GAB will expand reach by adding leagues to the professional in 2021

Abraham “Baham” Mitra, Chairman of the Games and Amusements Board (GAB) during the PSA Forum.

MANILA, Philippines – In addition to basketball, boxing and mixed sports, the Games and Amusements Board has added volleyball, football, chess and esport to the country’s growing professional sport this year.

And it is ironic that the growth took place in the midst of a raging and restrictive global COVID-19 health crisis.

“We tried to innovate and made so much effort to revive the sport in this pandemic,” said GAB chairman Abraham Kahlil “Baham ” Mitra.

“It’s not easy, but thanks to the support of the leagues, the promoters, the players themselves and of course the sponsors, professional sports have already started again with the live audience,” Mitra added.

The latest addition to the regulator’s powers is the fast-growing Maharlika Pilipinas Basketball League, which recently became a professional by joining the ranks of the Philippine Basketball Federation and Pilipinas VisMin Super Cup.

The GAB also strictly controls other basketball leagues, such as the Chooks-to-Go Pilipinas 3 × 3, the National Basketball League, the Women’s National Basketball League, and Filipino players and teams in the East Asian Super League.

The GAB grants players professional licenses that allow them to play for pay and maintain their livelihood.

“Obtaining a permit requires you to be a professional. It has been given, but it is not right. It’s a privilege, but it can be taken away at any time, ”said Mitra, whose agency was elected the World Boxing Council’s Commission of the Year twice, this year and in 2017.

“As a professional, you will be asked to attend a training seminar on what it is like to be a professional. You have to condemn all forms of match-fixing and you have to respect your comrades, your opponents and of course your team and the league officials, ”he added.

Prior to Duterte’s rule, the GAB limited its focus to professional basketball, boxing, mixed martial arts, horse racing, and cockfighting.

The state-run professional sports regulator now added control over volleyball, football, chess, karate, billiards, bowling, women’s boxing, tennis, table tennis, wrestling and esport, which players and fighters earn a living by competing.

Players in the Premier Volleyball League, the Philippine Football League, the Philippine Professional Chess Federation must obtain GAB licenses as well as Filipino fighters in the ONE Championship, Universal Reality Combat Championship, Philippine Wrestling Revolution, Manila Wrestling Federation and Ultimate Muaythai Challenge. Philippine Islands.

“I think this is the golden age of Philippine sports, not to mention winning our first gold medal at the Olympics,” Mitra said.

WBC praised GAB this year for its pioneering efforts to launch the installation of portable infrared CT scanners in standby mode for boxers during battle cards.

The professional boxing organization of 161 countries also praised the GAB in 2017, when the agency began waiving annual treatment fees for all Filipino boxers in cooperation with the Department of Health.

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