<<Print>>

Ghana�s Amateur boxing team failed to participate at the world championship scheduled for Doha, Qatar due to the inability of the Sports Ministry to provide the team with participation fee. The team was scheduled to leave for Doha on Monday after all effort made by the chairman, Gideon Quartey yielded no fruit. The Doha world championship forms part of the qualification to the Olympics in Brazil, failing to participate means black bombers will be out of the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. �We�re supposed to leave for Doha on Monday and if we couldn�t go, that will be it. It�s all over for Ghana boxing and this will affect the game including the boxers who qualified to participate in the games.� Most of them would have participated at the world championship for the first time but with this attitude by our leaders they have killed their dreams of becoming great boxers in the future,� Gideon lamented with pain. "The minister said he was going to help us get tickets to the games but participation fees and other things are a bit huge... there is no assurance that we will be going to the games,� he added. Ghana boxing have been ever-present at the Olympic Games since Ike Quartey Snr won the country's first medal in 1964, but faces the ignominy of missing out on Rio 2016 for the first time because with just few days to the commencement of the world championship which also serves as the qualification to Brazil next year, the Black Bombers still don't have the means to travel and will faces sanctions from IBA. The team moved straight to camping immediately after they returned from the All African Games. Four boxers of the bombers have qualified for the Olympic Games. �IBA has given us a big headlines that shows Ghana will be representing the country with four boxers but here is the case the team is still down here in Ghana.� �Some of us are willing to naturalize to fight for different countries because the sports is not been treated well in Ghana,� one of the boxers said. The four boxers who have qualified for the world championship are; Sulemanu Tetteh, Annan Ampiah Akimos, David Bawa and Musa Rahman Lawson.