Boxing world mourns veteran promoter and church leader ‘Champion’ Bakubaku
MESULI ZIFO and BONGANI MAGASELA
The death of veteran boxing promoter Andile “Champion” Bakubaku has shaken the boxing fraternity, leaving the sport’s nose bloodied yet again.
Bakubaku, 61, died on Monday night at his Ndevana home near King William’s Town after a long illness.
The man who went by the self-proclaimed moniker of
“Champion of the World” was still active in boxing promotion, having occupied the executive of the Eastern Cape Boxing Promoters Association as deputy to chair Thando Zonke.
“The news took us all by surprise though we knew that Champion had been experiencing poor health,” Zonke said.
Bakubaku carved his niche in boxing long before Zonke was involved in the game, working with several boxing stakeholders including the now gravely ill Mzimasi Mnguni.
They produced several champions, including Nkosinathi Joyi, in their on-and-off relationship.
At times Bakubaku, who remained one of the few boxing people who could confront Mnguni when feeling that he had been wronged, would wage a brazen war against his friend — such as when Mnguni’s boxer Mzi Dintsi controversially knocked out Xolani Ndleleni for the SA junior bantamweight title at Orient Theatre in 2000.
In the ring shortly after the late Port Elizabeth referee Mthunzi Mapitiza had inexplicably counted out Ndleleni, although he was on his feet and dominating the fight, Bakubaku accused Mnguni of influencing the outcome.
But the pair would make up and resume their friendship again.
“Champion was my true friend through and through, and he visited me last month, ” Mnguni said.
Though he never boxed himself, Bakubaku had an uncanny eye for talent.
He would describe his greatest boxing moment as the time when his unknown and unheralded Zimele Mpusulwa, whom he had plucked from obscurity, knocked out the fancied Lawrence Ngobeni to win the SA junior welterweight title in Uitenhage in 2002.
Long after the fight ended Bakubaku, who was also a church bishop, was still praying in the ring, thanking the Almighty for the win and subjecting the television crew to a long wait to conduct customary post-fight interviews.
Boxing SA Eastern Cape manager Phakamile Jacobs described Bakubaku’s death as the big loss to boxing.
“Champion did his share in boxing, dedicating his life to the sport,” Jacobs said.
“We have lost a real man here. Champion was a man of peace; where people fought he would come and intervene under his cap of being a bishop.”
Funeral arrangements have not yet been announced.
Champion did his share in boxing, dedicating his life to the sport