Magwaca to push career on world stage

THE marginal WBF world title won by Duncan Village-born Mzuvukile Magwaca will help him relaunch his floundering international career.

This was revealed by his manager Mla Tengimfene after the Cape Townbased boxer annexed the vacant WBF bantamweight crown with a points decision over Filipino Jason Canoy at the weekend.

Magwaca was fighting for the first time in over a year having last fought when he beat Mexican Raul Eliseo Medina in East London in November 2015.

The highly talented boxer was one of the three East London boxers whose inactivity led the stripping off their international titles which had helped them climb up the world ratings. The others were Lusanda Komanisi who lost his IBO featherweight title and Simpiwe Vetyeka who was Magwaca’s stablemate at now suspended Sijuta Promotions.

Komanisi and Vetyeka are still yet to get action with the former’s fight called off at the last minute in Morocco two months ago.

Magwaca was destined to stardom as he was being steered towards a world title challenge leading to the WBA to rate him in their top ten.

But the suspension of his promoter rendered him inactive with several promised bouts falling off the radar.

Finally he managed to get a shot at the vacant WBF bantamweight and grabbed the opportunity with hands by winning the title.

His management is now planning to keep him more active by either defending the newly won crown or engage in international bouts.

“What happened to Magwaca was injustice and should not be allowed to happen again,” said Tengimfene who also manages Zolani Tete.

“We want to keep him active now by either defending his title or engaging in international bouts. The fact of the matter is that Magwaca is still a recognisable name in boxing so it will not be that hard to move him accordingly. The challenge was to first get him into the both ring to wear off the rust and now that it has happened it should not be that difficult to keep him active.”

Nicknamed “Old Bones” Magwaca, whose aunt Violet was once a Boxing SA board member, will use the WBF title to launch his career to bigger things.

“People tend to look down on the WBF title but remember it has launched the careers of numerous boxers,” said Tengimfene.

Indeed another East London boxer Simpiwe Nongqayi first won the WBF title before progressing to win the IBF crown in the junior-bantamweight division.

Tengimfene said he was busy working on getting Magwaca back into the ring as soon as possible.