Ramson attests to improved Sport Ministry at budget debates

As Budget 2026 debates continued in the National Assembly at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre (ACCC), Liliendaal, on Thursday, Sport Minister Charles Ramson Jr took to the mic, unveiling a long list of transformational projects that have reshaped the Sport Ministry since the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) took office in 2020.
The Minister, in his passionate presentation, hit back at criticisms from the Opposition’s side of the House, speaking to the restoration of the Ministry and the benefit of the personnel added.
Ramson Jr told the National Assembly, “I want everybody to understand, when we restored this Ministry, at the level of the people’s progressive party, we knew how important this Ministry was then and that it is now. It must have a say at the level of the cabinet, and because of that now too, I want to welcome Steven and James, and I also want to acknowledge the hard work of another MP, the Director of Youth. I would take Suresh Singh over all of y’all combined on my team.”
“We undertook the responsibility of building five stadiums, and those are huge undertakings. In fact, all of those stadiums will be opened this year. I want to be clear, the first one is happening on Saturday, and it’s a really, really beautiful facility,” the Sport Minister shared.
Ramson went on to back up his claims, citing improved relations with athletes and associations and better athlete performances over the past 5 years.
Ramson Jr said about his Ministry’s work in the last five years, “Over the last five years, we lit 145 grounds in this country; they set us a target of 25, and we did 145 grounds. We started for the first time in this country a national sports academy, categorised into core and non-core sports. We built strong relationships with sports associations, and all of the sports associations have issued their support for us, this Ministry, and the budget because they know how they’ve benefitted.”
“Importantly as well, we started tracking and measuring how many medals our athletes started to secure; they have never been tracked before. In the last three years alone, we have secured over 1000 international and regional medals by our athletes. Athletes are doing better now than they’ve ever done before, under the PPP leadership,” he further enlightened.
The sport Minister also took the time to update on his Ministry’s legislative progress, revealing that the National Sport Police is likely to be passed this year.
“We passed two pieces of legislation, including the much-desired Horse Racing Authority Act. We completed the draft for the Sports Policy, and it will be completed by the Cabinet this year,” Ramson Jr divulged.
Sport was allocated a whopping $6B in the 2026 National Budget, as announced by Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh last week. Amongst the major projects earmarked for sport this year is the completion of four international-standard stadiums and the continuation of the community grounds project to the tune of $1.3B.