Maurice Kambukwe
One of Namibia’s foremost amateur golfers Likius Nande is putting all systems in place to secure his participation in the upcoming Sunshine Tour Qualifying tournament, a competition he says forms part of his bigger plans to eventually relocate to South Africa to pursue a professional career.
In a wide-ranging conversation with this publication, 26-year-old Nande shared his long-term plans of turning professional in South Africa, a country he feels offers more opportunities for amateur golfers and a range of premium golf competitions.
In total, Nande has won 23 national championships, two continental championships, the 2018 MTC Sports Star of the Year and Simply You Magazine Lifestyle and Fashion Awards Sports Personality of the Year in 2019.
As a start, the young Swakopmund-born golfer plans to participate in one of the legs of the much sought-after Sunshine Tour Qualifying tournaments, which he said offers great competition and exposure to high-level golf.
But to compete in one of the qualifying tournaments as well as eventually realising his dream of relocating to South Africa to play professional golf, Nande would need funds to facilitate his gigantic plans, and he has since announced that a fundraising golf day will be staged this weekend for that particular purpose.
The fundraising golf day will be held at the Windhoek Country Club golf course, where an avalanche of amateur and veteran golfers will be expected to strut their stuff in support of the highly talented young Nande.
“It was always my dream to compete against the best in the game and South Africa has one of the best circuits in the world. So, I believe if you want to prove yourself as a top player, you need to challenge the best to see how far you can go with your career. With my plans to move to South Africa, I really have to give all credit to my management team for putting in the necessary work to promote the Likius Nande brand. The support has been unreal since I moved to Windhoek this year. My target is to get my name on the leader board as much as I can. It’s going to be tough but I believe in hard work,” said the determined Nande.
He plans to move to South Africa as early as next month, and will be competing in local competitions in that country under the stewardship of a golf academy.
“So far, I have approached a couple of academies in South Africa, and they are all showing interest in taking me under their wings. It’s just up to me to make up my mind to choose an academy that will suit my game.”
In terms of young golf talents in Namibia, Nande said there is plenty of talent in the country but the problem remains the facilities that are either few or dilapidated. He also added the current state of golf in Namibia is good but there is huge room for improvement.
“Golf is on a proper standard but there’s still room for improvement, the leaders need to put out more tournaments for players to compete regularly. We have a lot of talent in the country; that’s the truth, but the only problem is we don’t have enough training facilities and that is keeping us a bit behind and that is why every good golfer moves out when it’s time to turn professional, because you need to put in work on different courses and different conditions.”
– mkambukwe@nepc.com.na