World Boxing boss praises ‘Gloves over Guns’

PRESIDENT OF World Boxing Boris van der Vorst has high praises for Jamaica’s ‘Gloves over Guns’ initiative and has outlined a road map for success as he partners with the Jamaica Boxing Association (JBA) and the Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) to keep the Olympic dream alive.

Van Der Vorst, whose five-day visit to Jamaica ends today, was speaking at a press conference yesterday at Olympic Manor, headquarters of the JOA.

“I was really touched to see how boxing can change the lives of young boys and young girls; and even not only change their lives, some of them save their lives. I think that’s amazing,” van der Vorst pointed out.

“It shows how relevant boxing is, and it was, for me, truly inspirational to make that visit in Montego Bay yesterday,” he added.

The van der Vorst-led World Boxing is a breakaway group that was established in 2023, shortly before the International Boxing Association lost its Olympic recognition due to governance issues and a lack of financial transparency.

Now it is looking to cement itself as the flagship international federation for Olympic boxing after increasing its membership to 89 countries, including Jamaica.

Since then, World Boxing has restored the sport’s place at the Los Angeles Games in 2028 after being granted provisional recognition by the International Olympic Committee last month.

“I’m here as president of World Boxing and for me, it’s also important to develop the Caribbean region and we have a road map for LA 2028,” he noted.

With that said, van der Vorst will assist in laying the framework to develop coaches in Jamaica who will eventually unearth and develop great boxers.

“All the stakeholders, including the Olympic Committee, Ministry of Sports, and corporate companies, need to also take some responsibility to facilitate these conditions. But I’m pretty optimistic about the cooperation,” he reiterated.

A beaming Stephen ‘Bomber’ Jones, JBA president, reiterated the importance of such a historic visit to the island.

“He demands excellence. The trip that he’s taken here wasn’t taken lightly by him. So, he came and he was very impressed by what he’s seen,” said Jones.

“He was pleasantly surprised to see the number of boxers, the amount of people that turned out. The parents, the teachers. So now his biggest takeaway was, we need to make sure we galvanise that and have the coaches upgraded into a position that they can compete, and that they can [do so] officially, not just here, but internationally,” Jones added.

Jones, who has been at the helm of the JBA since 2011, said his number one goal is to get boxing into 16 schools, so that they can have a high school championship and build from there.

“Hopefully, we get PE teachers from schools that we can put on a national level and then, through Mr van der Vorst, have a high-level coach come down to train the coaches, so that everybody has a level platform,” Jones explained.

Meanwhile, President of the JOA, Christopher Samuda, said his organisation’s support of boxing is strategic and so is World Boxing’s visit.

“The Jamaica Olympic Association, threw its support behind the Jamaica Boxing Association. It’s strategic, because we need to develop a road map, a sustainable model, so that we can transition our boxers to the international stage, to the world stage.

“It’s strategic because we are benefiting from the dialogue that we are conducting with the president of our boxing here now, so that he can look at our infrastructure, look at our boxers, look at our administrators, and make recommendations as to how we can deepen that engagement with those three critical assets of sport: the administrator, coach, and the talent. So, for us, it is a welcome visit,” said Samuda.

Jones also thanked S Hotel, KFC, Doctor’s Cave Foundation, Sandals Foundation, Pier One, Deja Resort, and Ultra Medical Services for helping to make the trip possible.