Early in the millennium, boxing’s premier title will return to Africa, writes Gavin Evans
Think of the world heavyweight champion, and it’s big Americans who come to mind. From Jack Johnson to Evander Holyfield, all the great ones have been drawn from the south and east flanks of the United States. In fact, for only four of the past 100 years has a European held the honour of undisputed world champion, and no one else has yet had a look in.
Mix this reality with the myopic jingoism of the Yankee fight crowd, and it is hardly astonishing that there persists an abiding prejudice about horizontal heavies from abroad – although Lennox Lewis’s moral victory over Holyfield may have dented this.
Unfortunately for the Americans, the decline of the US fight game has coincided with its take-off in much of the rest of the world, including Eastern Europe, Central America, the Orient and parts of Africa.
The latest contingent of heavyweight prospects includes a sprinkling of stars-and- stripes thoroughbreds, but they’re already being overshadowed by the infidels – men like the 1,7m Samoan wrecking ball David Tua, the 2,3m Ukrainian precision puncher Vitalij Klitschko and a batch of hopefuls from the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, Germany, Georgia and Tonga. South Africa is hanging in there with the ageing Corrie Sanders, but the most sustained challenge emanates from Nigeria, for reasons of nature and nurture.
First, there is the gene pool. West Africa, in particular Nigeria, tends to produce taller, heavy-boned men – a prerequisite for a modern heavyweight. If one takes slavery into account, it could be argued that almost every outstanding heavyweight of the past 40 years can trace their roots to this part of the world.
Another consideration is the patterns of migration between Nigeria and the UK in the post-war years. As a direct result, several UK leading heavyweights were born or raised in Nigeria.
The most renowned is the volatile 27-year-old Nigerian-born, British-raised World Boxing Organisation (WBO) champion Herbie Hide. He was only two when his mother brought him to Britain in 1973 to be adopted by the Hide family of Norwich. Under the guidance of his current manager, John Fashanu, he has started stressing his African credentials.
“I came out here as a toddler, so I can’t recall much of the experience of those early years, but I always go back to Nigeria – once every year or so, and I’ve never really broken the connection,” he told me. “My mother and father lived there, I have a house in Abuja and I’ve just bought land there, and my family always flies from Nigeria to watch me fight, so I definitely consider myself to be an African.”
If Hide’s accent speaks less of Lagos than Norwich, his Dulwich-born, Las Vegas-based rival, Henry Akinwande, sounds more authentic, having spent most of his first 19 years in Nigeria.
His promoter, Don King, likes to call him “my Zulu warrior”, though this is a reflection of King’s verbal licence rather than of the elongated former WBO champion’s ancestry.
But while the British contingent reflects an aspect of this diaspora, even more significant has been the quality of the homegrown training. Just as Accra in Ghana has produced a stream of outstanding fighters below middleweight and Mdantsane in South Africa has been a factory for brilliant tiny men, so the Lagos system has pumped out big men of international class in the heavier divisions over the past decade.
In fact, only Cuba can match the three Olympic medals won by Nigerian behemoths in the last two Olympics. What has been missing, however, is the kind of professional infrastructure to ease the way to making money out of it all.
The professional path was laid by the marvellous Biafran, Richard Ihetu. After making his mark in Lagos, Ihetu shifted base to London, and was renamed Dick Tiger by his promoters. He eventually cleaned up the British middleweight division and then made his move to conquer the US, twice winning the world middleweight title before holding the world light heavyweight crown in the late 1960s.
The first of the modern crop to follow this route was Richard Igbineghu, who was renamed Richard Bango to ease the strain on Anglo ears. After winning the Olympic super heavyweight silver medal, this 1,98m, 108kg heavy was enticed to Britain by an outfit calling themselves Kopro.
What Bango did not realise was that this organisation was a front for the disgraced fraudster, Roger Levitt, and was not on a sound financial footing. He picked up a trio of victories (and very little pay) before Kopro was deregistered by the British Boxing Board. The dispirited heavy moved to Las Vegas where he disappeared without trace after a few fights.
The next batch bypassed Britain and signed contracts with leading US promoters such as South African-born Cedric Kushner and Las Vegas-based Bob Arum. The pattern of moving to USpromoters was set by Bango’s buddy, the 1992 Olympic heavyweight silver medallist David Izonritei (later renamed Izon). He made his move in 1993, and built up a decent record over a series of stiffs.
I first watched him in the flesh in Connecticut in 1996 when he was put in with the formidable David Tua. The 1,88m Izon was a revelation, boxing superbly behind his jab and absorbing some terrible punches. They were even on points as they began the 12th and final round, but Tua managed to find the punch he was after and ended the fight.
Since then the 28-year-old Izon has been an inconsistent performer, losing in five to the huge leading US prospect, Michael Grant, but knocking out fringe contenders Lou Savarese and Daroll Wilson to build up a record of 22 wins (20 knockouts) in 25 fights.
A more serious threat to US domination is the 1,9m, 108kg 26-year-old Ike “The President” Ibeabuchi (real name Ikefula Ibeabuchic), who began his professional career in Lagos in 1994 before settling in Texas. He laboured in obscurity for his first 16 fights before pulling off one of the major upsets of 1997 by narrowly outpointing Tua, throwing almost 1 000 punches in 12 rounds.
Soon after, however, he was arrested for kidnapping and assaulting the son of his former girlfriend and then crashing his car into a motorway overpass. The boy survived with several broken bones, and the boxer was released on parole on condition he receive psychiatric counselling. As a result he was out of action for more than a year, but now claims to have found Jesus, straightened out his life and has continued on his winning way.
The latest export is Buguma-born Duncan “The Fugitive” Dokiwari (26) who was twice beaten by Ibeabuchi in the amateurs but won the 1996 Olympic super heavyweight bronze medal for Nigeria before launching his professional career from a Canadian base in late 1997, and then relocating to Las Vegas last year.
A muscular man, he showed immense power against inferior opposition with a string of first round knockouts. However, in January he dropped a close decision to the unbeaten Chicagoan Fres Oqendo – his only loss in 14 bouts.
Dokiwari still lacks the professional experience of top men, while Izon is the kind of fighter who could get a stop-gap shot at the world title but is not quite up to the elite level. Hide, Akinwande and Ibeabuchi, however, all belong among the world’s top 10.
Hide speaks confidently of becoming the “first-ever African heavyweight world champion” – a reflection of the fact that his low-rent WBO title is not the genuine item and that Larry Holmes was the real world champion when South Africa’s Gerrie Coetzee claimed the World Boxing Association title.
Hide’s assets are certainly impressive – his hands, feet and reflexes are among the quickest in the division and his record of 30 knockouts in 31 wins is testimony to the fact that despite being a “mere” 1,85m and weighing in at 100kg, he has plenty of power. However, it is that one loss which makes me wonder.
Four years ago he took on a fading Riddick Bowe and suffered six knockdowns before being stopped in the sixth. Hide claims that was a reflection of youth, inexperience and poor training, but he has yet to beat anyone out of the top drawer to prove his point. He has also been plagued by setbacks – the death of his brother from leukaemia, a series of extramural fights and run-ins with the law, and, most recently, a skin illness that scuppered his February 13 defence against the American, Orlin Norris.
Akinwande is also plagued by the sole minus on his 35-fight record. After impressively beating a series of men in the world’s top 20, this 2m, 110kg spoiler froze against Lewis in 1997, clung on for dear life and was eventually disqualified in the fifth round. Since then he has beaten Norris to remain in contention, and many thought the combination of his size, awkwardness, accuracy, a defensive excellence and sharp right cross would have been too much for the ageing Holyfield, but a bout of Hepatitis A temporarily put him out of the picture.
However, King’s largesse ensured he remained the World Boxing Congress’s mandatory contender and he has been guaranteed a shot at the Holyfield/Lewis winner.
Ibeabuchi may well have the best prospects of the three. He possesses neither the speed of Hide, nor the slippery skills of Akinwande, but he is younger, stronger, more solid of chin and, one suspects, of heart than either of them.
>From what I’ve seen of him he has a heavy jab, a tight defence, a very high work rate and, after 18 knockouts in 22 straight wins, plenty of power. He is also taking a far tougher root to the top than the British contingent. Having pipped the terrifying Tua, he faced an even more difficult challenge in the unbeaten leading US contender Chris Byrd in Tacoma, Washington, on March 20.
Byrd, a southpaw, was as fast as Hide, as awkward as Akinwande and avoided by all the other leading contenders. Ibeabuchi, however, had few serious problems, stalking Byrd for four rounds before catching him on the ropes, dropping him and then finishing him off in impressive style.
“The President” is now up there with Michael Grant as the next big thing in the heavyweight division. “I’m so confident of my ability,” he says. “If you’re not, if you have any doubts, I don’t see how you can do well in this game. I have a game plan for everyone out there.”
He’s still a year or so away from tangling with Lewis, but one suspects that sometime early in the new millennium boxing’s premier title will return to the continent of its post-war genetic roots, even if the battle site remains the slave lands of Vegas and Atlantic City.