In an an­ti-cli­mat­ic fin­ish, Mer­le Bag­goo was elect­ed as the first-ever women's pres­i­dent of the T&T Ta­ble Ten­nis As­so­ci­a­tion (TTT­TA) at its an­nu­al gen­er­al elec­tions (AGM) which were held vir­tu­al­ly, yes­ter­day.

The first women's foot­ball ref­er­ee lo­cal­ly and in the Eng­lish-speak­ing Caribbean, Bag­goo of Queen's Park Ta­ble Ten­nis Club was ex­pect­ed to come up against for­mer ex­ec­u­tive mem­ber and 12-time na­tion­al sin­gles women’s cham­pi­on Aleena Ed­wards for the post of pres­i­dent and will now serve as head of the ex­ec­u­tive un­til 2024.

How­ev­er, be­fore the elec­tions, Ed­wards of the Uni­ver­si­ty of T&T (UTT) sent a let­ter to the mem­bers wish­ing Bag­goo well in her new role and stat­ing that she was no longer in­ter­est­ed in con­test­ing the po­si­tion.

Orig­i­nal­ly, when the list of nom­i­nees for the po­si­tion was re­leased a few weeks ago, no few­er than sev­en nom­i­nees were named for the po­si­tion of pres­i­dent.

How­ev­er, on Sat­ur­day, on the eve of the elec­tions, it was con­firmed that Sher­don Pierre, Kevin Lewis, Dave Ra­moutar, Yu­vraaj Dookram and Ken­neth Par­manand all opt­ed out of the bat­tle for the ex­ec­u­tive’s top po­si­tion.

This left, Ed­wards, a for­mer TTT­TA gen­er­al sec­re­tary and Bag­goo, a mem­ber of the North Zone Ta­ble Ten­nis As­so­ci­a­tion as well as the lone con­tes­tants, un­til the for­mer late with­draw­al.

Bag­goo now takes over the po­si­tion left va­cant by David Joseph, who opt­ed to va­cate the post ear­li­er this month ahead of their AGM.

Just last month (March 23), the un­der-fire Joseph and his ex­ec­u­tive was the sub­ject of a strong­ly word­ed let­ter and a pe­ti­tion signed by sev­er­al clubs re­quest­ing their re­moval.

The pe­ti­tion was sent to Sham­fa Cud­joe, Min­is­ter of Sport and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment, Gabre Mc­Tair, Di­rec­tor of Phys­i­cal Ed­u­ca­tion and Sport Di­vi­sion in the Min­istry of Sport and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment, Bri­an Lewis, Pres­i­dent of the T&T Olympic Com­mit­tee (T&TOC).

The oth­er mem­bers who were elect­ed un­op­posed at yes­ter­day's an­nu­al gen­er­al meet­ing were Kevin Lewis (first vice-pres­i­dent), Richard Copeland (sec­ond vice-pres­i­dent) Vas­dev Bob Roop­nar­ine (gen­er­al sec­re­tary), Leah Fras­er (as­sis­tant sec­re­tary), Dave Ra­moutar (pub­lic re­la­tions of­fi­cer), and Ken­neth Par­manand as the trea­sur­er af­ter Bag­goo de­clined to con­test the po­si­tion fol­low­ing her ap­point­ment as pres­i­dent.

Oth­er mem­bers of his ex­ec­u­tive in­clud­ed Leon El­liot (first vice pres­i­dent), Win­ston Greene (sec­ond vice pres­i­dent), Je­lani Bram­ble (third vice pres­i­dent), Leah Fras­er (gen­er­al sec­re­tary) re­signed as was re­placed by Ed­win Caines, Arvind Teemul (trea­sur­er), Nicole Lee (as­sis­tant sec­re­tary), Davone Joseph (as­sis­tant sec­re­tary) and Deb­bie Mc-Ewin-John (Pub­lic Re­la­tions Of­fi­cer).

The oth­er mem­bers who were elect­ed un­op­posed at yes­ter­day's an­nu­al gen­er­al meet­ing were Kevin Lewis (First Vice-Pres­i­dent), Richard Copeland (Sec­ond Vice-Pres­i­dent) Vas­dev Bob Roop­nar­ine (Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary), Leah Fras­er-Austin (As­sis­tant Sec­re­tary), Dave Ra­moutar (Pub­lic Re­la­tions Of­fi­cer), and Ken­neth Par­manand as the Trea­sur­er af­ter Bag­goo de­clined to con­test the po­si­tion fol­low­ing her ap­point­ment as pres­i­dent.

T&T Ta­ble Ten­nis As­so­ci­a­tion Ex­ec­u­tive

Pres­i­dent: Mer­le Bag­goo (QPCC) - elect­ed un­op­posed

First vice pres­i­dent: Kevin Lewis (Cru­saders) - elect­ed un­op­posed

Sec­ond vice pres­i­dent: Richard Copeland (Pow­er­Gen) - elect­ed un­op­posed

Gen­er­al sec­re­tary: Vas­dev Bob Roop­nar­ine (Pow­er­Gen) - elect­ed un­op­posed

As­sis­tant sec­re­tary: Leah Fras­er (Glad­i­a­tors) - elect­ed un­op­posed

Pub­lic Re­la­tions Of­fi­cer: Dave Ra­moutar (War­renville Unit­ed) - elect­ed un­op­posed

Trea­sur­er: Ken­neth Par­manand (Hillview Rene­gades) - elect­ed un­op­posed