Hesron Kapanga
Namibian amateur boxers who competed at the 2023 Boxing Africa qualifier for the 2024 Paris Olympics will have to wait for Italy or Thailand if they are to win any quotas for their country.
Namibia sent a team of four boxers to the 2023 African Olympic Boxing Qualifiers, which were held in Dakar, Senegal, from 09 to 16 September 2023, with the hope of winning a gold medal and automatically qualifying for the Olympics.
Only one boxer Gerald Ipinge, who competes in the 80kg category, managed to win a bronze medal for Namibia, which was not good enough to qualify him for
the global showpiece as only seven quotas were available in the seven different weight classes in the men’s category.
Two quotas were up for grabs in the
five different women’s weight classes.
After six days of boxing, 13 boxers celebrated their gold medals at the African Olympic Boxing qualifying event in Dakar, Senegal.
There were 18 quotas available for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, and Algeria became the most successful nation with five spots, while Nigeria, Egypt, and Morocco each bagged three Olympic quotas, while DR Congo, Mozambique, Tunisia, and Zambia received one place for Paris 2024.
African boxers who failed to land themselves and their nation a slot for Paris 2024 will have a chance to earn more quotas during the first World Olympic Boxing qualifier that will be held in Italy and the second World Olympic qualifier scheduled for Thailand next year.
The African Olympic Boxing Qualifying Event saw 41 countries participate, with 235 boxers exchanging leather in 13 weight classes. The biggest delegations of boxers came from Morocco and Senegal, with 13 boxers each, while the smallest delegations came from Benin, Burundi, Congo,
Liberia, and Sudan, each with one boxer.
Namibia finished 15th on the medal list, standing alongside Cape Verde, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Uganda, Seychelles, Lesotho, Sierra Leone, South Africa, and Uganda. They all won a bronze medal.
Algeria finished at the top of the medal standings with four golds, two silvers, and three bronzes.
– Nampa