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Boxing federation can do better

Editorial logo Nation.Africa

By  Editorial

The 2024 Boxing Federation of Kenya (BFK) national league ended on Saturday in Homa Bay County with the Kenya Defence Forces team, Defaba, being declared the winners for the first time since 2014.

Defaba collected 24 points from the well-attended fifth and final leg played in Raila Odinga Stadium for a total of 126 points, beating Kenya Police, Chafua Chafua and Nairobi, to second place respectively, with a total of 46 points each. While we don’t want to take away the glint and sparkle from Defaba, the participation by Chafua Chafua in two legs in Mombasa and Nanyuki while skipping the Kisumu, Embu and Homa Bay legs for lack of funds, watered down the competition this season.

The fact that Defaba and Chafua Chafua tied on 26 points each in Mombasa but Defaba won in Nanyuki with 24 points against Chafua Chafua, who got 20, is a pointer that the contest could have gone down to the wire.

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It’s demoralising that Chafua Chafua boxers, who train and work hard throughout the year, can only feature in two legs, yet the team provides a big number of boxers to the national boxing team, the Hit Squad. The Africa light middleweight champion Boniface Mogunde is the Hit Squad captain, which attests to the calibre of boxers Kenya Police has.

Nevertheless, it was quite heartwarming to witness the huge turnout of fans in Homa Bay, which is in line with BFK president Anthony Otieno’s ambitious initiative of taking boxing to the grassroots under the “Ndondi Mashinani” initiative. However, lack of sponsorship to the league over the years, coupled with poor marketing strategy, has been BFK’s undoing.

Teams need to be rewarded for their efforts during the season and that can only happen with good sponsorship, hence BFK ought to pull up its socks. Police might have not missed the three legs if their efforts over the years were rewarded handsomely. This year has been good, with Mogunde winning the Africa title, the first by a Kenyan since Nick Okoth won Kenya its first African Games gold medal in 17 years.

In the headlines