Latest news with #Akot
Winnipeg Free Press
24-06-2025
- Sport
- Winnipeg Free Press
‘He's one of the guys that I have a lot of trust in'
Imagine playing pickup hoops inside your local YMCA and then a six-foot-eight professional basketball player steps onto the court and calls next. You better hope you end up on his team. This was the reality this spring at the Fermor Avenue location as Winnipeg Sea Bears forward Emmanuel Akot was a frequent visitor as he worked his way back into game shape after an ankle injury. Ruth Bonneville / Free Press Files Winnipegger and Winnipeg Sea Bears guard Emmanuel Akot has started seven of the team's 11 games and is averaging 9.5 points, 5.5 rebounds and 1.3 assists in 28 minutes per game. It should go without saying, but yes, he did dominate. 'Oh yeah, yeah, yeah,' confirmed Akot after the Sea Bears concluded practice on Tuesday at the Canada Life Centre. 'That helped my confidence a lot.' So did last summer when he joined his hometown Sea Bears in late May. There aren't many players who call Winnipeg home that have his size and athleticism, so at the very least, it was worth Sea Bears head coach and general manager Mike Taylor giving him a shot even though there wasn't an obvious spot for him in the rotation. Akot hadn't yet made a name for himself in the CEBL as he only played two games with the Ottawa Blackjacks the year before. Suiting up for his city seemed to be the perfect fit as Akot managed to hit the ground running and ended up being one of the few bright spots on a team with constant roster turnover as he closed out the campaign averaging 11.3 points, 3.4 rebounds and 2.1 assists. His best performance came against the Saskatchewan Rattlers last June when he exploded for 23 points while shooting 82 per cent from the field and hit the Target Score Time winner to lead the Sea Bears to a 103-101 victory at home. 'That was really my first time getting significant minutes as a pro. It gave myself confidence knowing that the work I'm putting in is paying off and I can play with a lot of these really good pros in this league,' said Akot, 26. 'It was a summer that built a lot of confidence within myself.' Thursdays Keep up to date on sports with Mike McIntyre's weekly newsletter. Unfortunately for him, he wasn't able to build off it when he went overseas this past winter. Akot signed with KK Wloclawek in Poland's top league and was expected to have a big role, but his season was over before it started as he tore ligaments in his ankle in an exhibition game and had to return to Winnipeg for surgery and treatment. It was the first serious injury Akot, who played five NCAA seasons between Arizona, Boise State and Western Kentucky, has ever had. 'It was tough because, at that point, I was rolling pretty good in the pre-season, and then I had to go eight or nine months without basketball,' said Akot. 'I came back home, had the surgery, and I couldn't do anything. I couldn't walk.' It forced him to put everything into this summer's CEBL season. Instead of hooping across Europe, he was bouncing back and forth between the Sport for Life Centre and YMCA to treat his ankle and work on his craft. He was the first player the Sea Bears signed for 2025. 'Last year, when we signed him, we signed him because he's a talented Winnipeg guy and we want the best Winnipeg guys playing in Winnipeg,' said Taylor. 'But the way Emman came in, he shot the ball so well from three, he played so well at both positions, the three and the four, that he was a guy that we really relied on. This year, we planned a bigger role for him. Unfortunately, he got hurt (in Poland), but he recovered, got his foot right, and has really helped our team this season as well. I love his energy; I love his versatility. 'Last year, when we signed him, we signed him because he's a talented Winnipeg guy and we want the best Winnipeg guys playing in Winnipeg.'–Mike Taylor, Sea Bears head coach and general manager 'He's one of the guys that I have a lot of trust in.' Even with a star duo on the roster in guard Jalen Harris and centre Simi Shittu, Akot is still one of the most important players on the floor. The former Kildonan East product has started seven of the team's 11 games and is averaging 9.5 points, 5.5 rebounds and 1.3 assists in 28 minutes per game. As for where he goes next, Akot said he's leaving that up to his agent to handle, but he is eager to get a full season under his belt somewhere. A return to Europe, or a spot in the NBA G League could be on the horizon. 'I think he'll have opportunities overseas, but you know, I coached over there for 20 years, to me, it's about finding the right place. And if he can find the right place with the right coach, that's going to put him in the right situation, that's gold,' said Taylor. 'So, we'll see how things develop for him. All I know is, for us right now in Winnipeg he's an excellent player and we really appreciate everything he does for our team.' The Sea Bears started this past weekend's road trip with a bang by beating the Vancouver Bandits (8-3) 92-85 on Friday. Canadian big Simi Shittu had a massive outing with 27 points and 14 boards. Two nights later in Edmonton, it was a different story as the Stingers prevailed 98-85 to drop Winnipeg to 5-6. Shittu had another impressive showing with 30 points and 12 rebounds. The loss snapped a four-game winning streak for the Sea Bears. 'The Vancouver win showed our potential to be great is there. We just have to stay disciplined to do the same things all over again for 40 minutes, every game,' said rookie forward Nathan Bilamu. 'But you could see with the Vancouver game that our potential to go all the way is there.' The Sea Bears host the Scarborough Shooting Stars (6-5) Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Canada Life Centre. Taylor AllenReporter Taylor Allen is a sports reporter for the Winnipeg Free Press. Taylor was the Vince Leah intern in the Free Press newsroom twice while earning his joint communications degree/diploma at the University of Winnipeg and Red River College Polytechnic. He signed on full-time in 2019 and mainly covers the Blue Bombers, curling, and basketball. Read more about Taylor. Every piece of reporting Taylor produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
Yahoo
07-02-2025
- General
- Yahoo
How Trump's Foreign-Aid Freeze Is 'Shaking the Whole System'
A sign for the World Food Programme outside a United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) food aid warehouse in Deir Al-balah, Gaza, on Jan. 23, 2025. Credit - Ahmad Salem—Bloomberg/Getty Images James Akot has three goats. He shares them with his wife, his mother, three younger siblings, and two of his cousin's children, in a household in Northern Bahr el Ghazal in South Sudan. The crops Akot's family planted were washed away in the floods last year, the fourth and worst flood in the region in four consecutive years. This month, food deliveries were due to arrive to his region to tide families over until the next crop. But in late January, Akot and his neighbors heard that these deliveries would not be coming. A volunteer community organizer, Akot is reluctant to talk about his woes; many in his region are so much worse off. Four of the local health centers have closed. Cholera cases are ticking up. Too many children are malnourished. There's a local refugee camp, Wedwill, overflowing with families who have fled war from just across the border in Sudan. Not all of this is because in early February, USAID funds were frozen for all but the most emergency and lifesaving missions; the World Food Programme had already announced it would need $404 million to serve the region before the 90-day pause imposed by the U.S. government on foreign aid. But the stoppage is making many dire situations into desperate ones. "This is not about one organization," says Marta Valdes Garcia, humanitarian director of Oxfam International. "It's a full humanitarian system that is working, and, under a specific coordination, aims to deliver humanitarian assistance for millions of people around the globe. The stop-work order is shaking the whole system." I ask Akot, 34, what he will do now. That's when he mentions the goats. "I have to sell one goat to get 10 kg [22 lbs.] of flour," he says. "We can eat it maybe for five to six days, because we are extended family. Then I sell another one. So for these 15 days, we are going to sell three goats. We don't know what will happen from there." He laughs, nervously, as he faces the enormity of it. Read More: How Christian Groups Are Responding to Trump's Foreign-Aid Freeze TIME spoke to humanitarian workers—many of whom asked not to be named for fear of reprisals to their employers—about the implications of the suspension. Schools for fourth- to sixth-grade girls are being closed in Afghanistan. Families are returning to destroyed neighborhoods in Gaza with no access to clean water, shelter, or provisions. Funding for teachers and supplies in Uganda has dried up. Tons of seeds are currently sitting in a warehouse in Haiti instead of being distributed to farmers. Maternal health and family-planning clinics in Malawi are shuttered. In Bangladesh, food assistance for refugees will be cut by half in March and run out entirely in April. "As bad as all these are, the things that you're not able to see right now are going to be the really devastating things," says a representative from an aid organization that works on nutrition in the Horn of Africa. "We're prioritizing severe acute malnutrition instead of moderate acute malnutrition. But if a child moves from moderate to severe acute malnutrition, there are all these developmental problems it causes and stunts them for the rest of their life. So we're literally causing kids to have an entire life of poor health because of the decisions we have to make." As the Trump Administration has pursued its goal of reducing government spending, it seems to be taking the same approach as big cats do when pursuing prey: move fast and take down the most vulnerable first. And the results are just as brutal. The U.S. was the biggest distributor of funds to countries in crisis, providing more than 40% of the world's nonmilitary foreign aid. When that wallet is suddenly zipped, even for three months, it puts the aid network under so much pressure that small holes in the web of support grow into chasms. And while any step back in funding by the world's richest economy is going to send shudders through the sector, this pullback came at a particularly disastrous time. Wars and political instability in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa have created crises that are difficult and expensive to alleviate. Natural calamities—floods, earthquakes, droughts, landslides—have also drained resources. Last year Germany, another big donor country, also scaled back its foreign aid, but didn't stop it completely. Because the future has become very uncertain, the careful planning and coordination aid organizations need to do is almost impossible. "We work in spaces like Syria or the occupied Palestinian territories that are very volatile," says Valdes Garcia. "The coordination mechanism that we have is put in place in order to support an efficient and effective response, to keep people safe, and to ensure that the response that is delivered is quality." Read More: Inside the Chaos, Confusion, and Heartbreak of Trump's Foreign-Aid Freeze One of the biggest issues aid workers on the ground are worried about is water sanitation. Under the terms of the funding pause, organizations are allowed to pursue "life-saving" activities, including emergency food distribution. But there is no point in delivering food if there is no clean water with which to wash and prepare it. "It was not clearly stated whether water sanitation was included in the waiver," says Valdes Garcia. Without access to clean water, people die, not just of thirst, but of waterborne diseases such as cholera. The nutrition organization in the Horn of Africa is continuing to truck water into communities with none but is not sure about whether water-treatment kits are also allowed, so they've paused distribution of those until funds are released. It galls many humanitarian workers that the USAID is being reviewed for wasting government money while many of the investments they have made in areas that take a while to pay off, such as education, are being frittered away. After the U.S. military pulled out of Afghanistan, humanitarian agencies spent months negotiating with Afghan leaders to allow girls to go to school beyond third grade in some regions. Aid agencies there worry that even if funds for the schools are restored after 90 days, the hard-won memoranda of understanding signed by the authorities may need to be renegotiated. "We have lost precious time in which girls can access schools, we may be losing negotiating power with the de facto authorities, and we may lose core design elements that are critical," says one agency director. Even in places where school is welcome, advances are being lost. Peter Waiswa works for the Global Compassion Coalition in Uganda and is the chairperson of the school management committee of Bulogo Primary School, where the academic year has just begun. He does not think it will last long. For many years, USAID has supported rural Ugandan children's education by paying for teachers' salaries and some supplies, through a program known as Universal Public Education. "Most of these schools that have been administering this program have put their students on high alert not to come to school," says Waiswa, since they won't be able to operate. "I am talking about millions of students, both in primary and secondary schools." Many of the parents, who live on less than a dollar a day, will not be able to afford to send them if they have to buy supplies. Agriculture is another area where the halt has squandered effort and time. World Relief, one of the few agencies funded by USAID to speak up about the impact of the funding cut, says it has 3.9 metric tons of bean seeds in Haiti that it cannot distribute, because of the stop-work order. "If they are not distributed soon, then the seeds will rot, farmers will miss planting season, and families will be at high risk for food insecurity," the organization said in a statement to TIME. "These are real people, real lives, hanging in the balance. This isn't about politics; it's about the very real consequences of these funding delays on the people we serve." It's easy to give in to despair, but for Akot and those who are bearing the brunt of the reduction in aid, that's just one more thing they can't afford. "Thinking about it, sometimes it gives you a hard time," he says of his family's situation. "I just keep encouraging them, 'Let's wait. Maybe this decision will be considered by the President of the United States.'" That's what I can tell them. But as for now, we do not have an idea of what we can do." Contact us at letters@
