The company owes the national boxing controlling body $317,000 in outstanding licence fees, which include sanction fees, following their failure to stage the World Boxing Union title fight between Zimbabwe’s Tapiwa Tembo and Zambia’s Gibson Kamota.
The two boxers had been match-made to fight in a World Boxing Union bantamweight title, initially set for October 26. The fight was moved to November 2 and then cancelled completely after Tembo, who is based in South Africa, had been in Zimbabwe for close to a month preparing for the bout.
Zimbabwe Boxing Board of Control secretary general Gilbert Munetsi said Deltaforce had not been paying their licence fees for some time and the debt had ballooned to $317,000. The cancellation came after Deltaforce failed to produce financial guarantees for the fight, after receiving the blessing of both the Zimbabwean boxing board and the World Boxing Union to have the fight staged in Zimbabwe.
Munetsi said they fined the promotion company for bringing the sport into disrepute, but the boxing promotion company has failed to pay the fine before the deadline.
Deltaforce promoter, Clyde Musonda, laughed-off the suspension saying his company would appeal against the ban as they had honoured their financial obligations.
Although they had skipped payment of their licences, they had made a pledge to the controlling body that they would do so as soon as they had received what they had been promised by their sponsors.
Musonda said the fight between Tembo and Kamota had not been aborted, but rescheduled to a date still to be advised. He said they were still putting finances in place for the world title.
The latest developments comes after Zimbabwe failed to find a promoter to bankroll the World Boxing Federation Inter-Continental heavyweight title fight between Zimbabwe’s Elvis Moyo, also based in South Africa and Zambia’s Francis Galagata Zulu.
Post published in: Sport