LESOTHO NEEDS TO UPGRADE STANDARD OF BOXING 

The President of the Lesotho Amateur Boxing Association, Lt Colonel Victor Mohapi says Lesotho needs to upgrade the standard of boxing so as to compete in World Championships. Speaking in an interview after returning from a referring session at the World Boxing Championships in Cuba last week, Mr Mohapi said the standard of performance portrayed at these championships, where Cuba presented the best boxers was high.

The President of LABA said out of the 52 world countries that took part in the recent world champions, only five African countries participated, with the Southern African region represented by South Africa with one boxer. He said this is an indication that the region has to pull up its socks to make a recognisable representation in world boxing. He said other African countries that took part were Cameroon, Algeria, Egypt and Tunisia.

Lt Colonel Mohapi was also delighted to mention that he was the only African Referee Judge that was invited to take part in the referring of the games and also managed to finish the session without problems or making mistakes that would have led to suspension like it happened with other referees. He said it was a tough job, adding that there were 252 bouts in all, which needed more experienced judges. He added that he was the youngest and less experienced in terms of years, citing that all the referees that judged the games were older and much more experienced.

"We were assessed from time to time to find out if we were not bias or made any mistakes and some of the referees and officials were suspended because of the mistakes they made' he added. He showed that this was the first time that Lesotho was invited to referee at the world boxing games, saying Basotho should take pride in that they were greatly represented.

01 October,2002