HATCHET BURIED?: Floro says sorry, vows ‘Tapal-gate’ won’t happen again

National Golf Association of the Philippines (NGAP) secretary general Bones Floro formally apologized to Dottie Ardina after the federation failed to provide her with proper competition uniform during the Paris Olympics.

But did she already bury the hatchet?

During the three-hour post-Olympic evaluation presided by Senator Christopher “Bong” Go on Tuesday, the 30-year-old Ardina ripped Floro for failing to provide her and fellow golfer Bianca Pagdanganan with proper competition uniform during the Summer Games earlier this month.

Ardina, who finished 13th in the women’s stroke play event, said she didn’t like Floro’s move to mask off the issue, making it appear that she was at fault for refusing to wear the federation’s locally-bought competition uniform during the second to final day of the tournament.

“I forgave him since it already happened. What I didn’t like was having the issue under wraps during the Olympics,” said Ardina in a video call from the United States, where she is set to compete in the FM Championships in Norton, Massachusetts.

“The reason I made the statement was because they made it appear that I was at fault. I would have never bought my own competition uniform if the ‘Plan B’ that he (Floro) came up with was not a failure.”

Floro said he is truly sorry for what happened and vowed that the brouhaha that sparked an outrage among members of the local golf community will not happen again.

Ardina’s dream Olympic appearance turned into a nightmare when NGAP failed to provide her with proper competition uniform.

But Floro stressed that they had everything figured out until the International Olympic Committee rejected their initial design with barely one week left before tee-off.

With that, the NGAP had to scramble for a replacement with the country’s official outfitter, Adidas, giving Floro two options whether to hand carry or have it shipped directly to the Athletes Village.

Floro said he chose the latter.

But disaster struck and the shipment got stranded at the French customs, leaving him with no choice but to devise a “Plan B” of buying competition uniforms at a local shop. Ardina tried to wear the locally-bought apparel on the first day of competition but refused to do so in the next few days as she found it “too tight.”

“How can you swing properly with that kind of fit?” Ardina said, adding that she resorted to buying her own apparel without the Philippine flag.

“Instead, I attached the flag on my apparel before every round so that I can comply with the competition requirements. But it turned us into laughingstocks with other athletes from other countries asking what happened to our competition uniform.”

Floro brushed off the incident, saying that it was just a simple case of “bad luck.”

“For me, Your Honor, we suffered bad luck during the shipment,” Floro said.

“We’ve been working with POC president Bambol and our sponsor, Adidas, since June. We have been taking their sizes.”

Senator Raffy Tulfo refused to buy Floro’s explanation, saying that the incident made the country a laughingstock in a tournament as big and as grand as the Summer Olympics.

“You were there to make sure that our athletes will have no other concerns than winning. But why did it happen? You had three years to prepare for this,” Tulfo said.

“You had days to get comfortable uniforms for our athletes. Where are the uniforms that were held in France? You should have contacted the French customs to have that sorted out. Now, everybody is laughing at us.”

A few hours after the session, Ardina took to social media her reaction to the hearing.

“Alam nyo naman kung ano talaga ang totoong nangyari. Pero sige,” Ardina said without directly alluding to anyone.

“Ipagpatuloy nyo lang lokohin mga sarili nyo.”