“One unforgettable night – another first.”
This is how boxing promoter Terry-Anne Hart described the upcoming tournament she will stage at Grand West Casino in Cape Town on August 8.
Hosted by Sun International, her Battle at the Island event will feature five championship fights.
Some of the boxers that will be in action — in her first tournament in the Mother City — include WBO Africa flyweight champ Sibulele “Lova” Soboois, former WBO SA, All Africa and ABU holder Smangele “Smash” Hadebe and SA lightweight titlist Bonita van Jaarsveld.
Hart said the event will feature eight bouts in total — five women and three men.
She would not let the cat out of the bag regarding the exact match-ups until Boxing SA and other international sanctioning boxing bodies give her the go-ahead.
“This is a historic first: the most women’s championship title fights ever assembled on a single card in Cape Town,” said Hart of Fighters Club Promotions.
She recently staged her first world title fight at the Wild Coast Sun in Bizana in a tournament headlined by women.
The only time women have previously topped boxing tournaments in SA is during August to celebrate Women’s Month.
Gauteng-based Hart, who is from Cape Town, said: “Taking boxing back to where I come from is something very special for me.
“It is important for me to revive, re-energise, uplift and attract the international market to collaborate with future sponsors so that Cape Town gets the necessary attention as far as boxing is concerned.”
She added: “No matter how far life takes you, there are certain places that never leave you, and for me that place is Edgemead [a residential suburb that lies at the foot of the Tygerberg hills].
“It is where I spent my childhood. It is where I learnt some of my earliest lessons about resilience, community and believing in myself.”
A qualified civil engineer, Hart said while her career has taken her into boardrooms, part of her will always be that girl from Edgemead with big dreams.
“I started this journey of boxing [last year, March] after the birth of my second child,” she said.
“I then realised there are opportunities for a multipurpose [boxing] event, but I could not do it because I did hold a licence. So I decided to start Fighters Club Promotions.”
Hart said she noticed women boxers were not getting opportunities or the right type of fights that would enable them to make statements as fighters.
Mainstream promoters have not yet warmed up towards women’s boxing despite the history made in 2011 by Noni Tenge, who won the IBF world title.
That was five years after women’s boxing had been permitted in SA.
Rodney Berman’s Golden Gloves staged the first female world championship in SA in 2007 when Laila “She Bee Stingin” Ali retained her WBC and WIBA super middleweight titles by her first-round stoppage of Gwendolyn “Stealth Bomber” O’Neil at Emperors Palace in Kempton Park.
Said Hart: “I think local sports, especially boxing, can now see [the opportunities] with the likes of Bernice ‘The Badger’ Ferreira, Tyla ‘Duracell’ Promnick and Sibulele Soboois winning the IBO, SA and WBO Africa belts, respectively.”
“This shows that the recipe we are utilising is working,” Hart said in her parting shot.
Sowetan
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