It has not been a good week for Boxing South Africa (BSA).
First the KwaZulu-Natal boxing commission gave them the finger, and then the man known as "The voice of boxing" refused to reconsider his decision of resigning from the Ratings Committee.
This followed a plea by Thabo Mseki to Bert Blewett, the editor of Boxing World magazine and a popular analyst on SABC 2. (Blow by Blow at 10pm every Friday).
Blewett said: "I told Thabo that there is too much interference, conflict of interest and lack of importance attached to the Ratings Committee by BSA.
"One moment we are told one thing by BSA, the next we are told another. We are disregarded and not respected."
Blewett sees only one way around this mess. "The Ratings Committee should be independent."
When Blewett quit he was joined by Andre de Vries, who has since done a U-turn, and made himself available again to BSA.
Said de Vries: "The Ratings Committee cannot act independently when instructed to make changes to the ratings."
And you thought boxers take a few too many punches!
You would think De Vries would have learnt from the Stephen Msimanga issue.
Msimanga was given approval by BSA to challenge Sithembile Kibiti for his national mini flyweight crown.
However, BSA then delivered a low blow.
Msimanga, despite being ranked at No. 1 for Kibiti's crown by the Ratings Committee, was dumped and replaced by Mzi Mnguni's fighter Neo Seboka. BSA then released their rankings which omitted Msimanga. Blewett said they were told to reinstate Msimanga on the ratings and then instructed to withdraw him.
The Msimanga and Kibiti title fight was scheduled for Friday night in Cape Town.
The final blow for Blewett, ear to the door, was when he found out that BSA planned to merge the sanctioning & ratings committee.
- Perhaps boxing world should consider publishing their "Independent rankings" just as the famous Ring magazine has always done.