The HABF failed to organize any competitions in 2008!
Unfortunately, the board of directors of the HABF under the leadership of Mr. Katsigiannis, has failed the people who elected and supported them. While great promises of forthcoming government financing were dispensed with great confidence, no funds were ever received for the purpose of organizing a championship. While the Ministry of Sports has clearly proven that they have absolutely no intention of providing funding for baseball, Mr. Katsigiannis, accordingly, did absolutely NOTHING! Under the circumstances the HABF leadership should have done its best to find other means of financing a championship or Cup tournament. They could have tried to solicit corporate sponsors for help or they could have asked the individual teams to secure funding to finance the cost of running a championship as was done in 2006. Instead, they sat back and allowed an entire year to go by without any official competitions.
The HABF secures funding to pay Employee salaries!
In the mean time, the Ministry of Sports has allocated funding to the HABF, but those funds can ONLY be used for the purpose of paying employee salaries, IKA, and taxes. Wonderful! But one might ask, "The Federation employees are getting paid to do what????????" What on earth is the purpose of paying employees who do absolutely nothing since there are no competitions. If the HABF is not organizing competitions then what is the purpose of having a Greek Baseball Federation at all????????
Baseball Players decide to create "Action Committees"!.
Under the circumstances, several baseball players, coaches, umpires, and club leaders decided to organize committees that would undertake the task of making an effort to salvage baseball in Greece before it eventually is allowed to simply evaporate. As per the formal consitituion of the HABF, committees are not only possible, but are actually required. Each committee must be approved by the HABF board of directors and each committee must include two HABF board members amongst its participants. Initially, three committees were formulated:
1. Championship Organizing Committee
2. Public Relations Committee
3. Baseball Development Committee
A formal written proposal was submitted to the HABF President on January 19, 2009 in which the names of the committee members were listed as well as descriptions of the proposed areas of responsibility for each committee. The proposal must be reviewed and approved by the board of directors of the HABF before any action can be assumed by the committee members. Unfortunately, not only has the HABF board of directors not approved of the proposal, but more importantly, Mr. Katsigiannis has not informed any of the other members of the board of this initiative at all. The non-action stance of the President is not only provocatively negligent, but it tempts one to believe that he has a very different agenda from that of everyone else involved in the sport. His behavior certainly does not support the concept that he is doing anything to promote our sport. To the contrary, it would seem that he is doing everything within his power to undermine the future of baseball in Greece entirely.