- Ricardo Makyn/Staff Photohrapher
Former Jamaica Boxing Board of Control president C. Lloyd Allen, points out the damage to the ring at the Stanley Couch Gym which he says is unsafe for boxers, during a tour of the facility on Friday.
Charmaine Austin, Staff Reporter
"RESIGN. THE non-performance and mediocrity will no longer be tolerated."
So said frustrated former Jamaica Boxing Board of Control president C. Lloyd Allen, who has challenged the present executive to quit and he wants them to do so no later than March of this year.
Allen on Friday toured two boxing facilities in the Corporate Area and grieved at their state, particularly that of the now defunct Guinness Gym.
The Guinness Gym was once the premier spot to host fights and produced a number of the country's world champions including Richard 'Shrimpy' Clarke.
The facility that once boasted an 18-bed dormitory, a high-tech kitchen from which boxers were fed three meals per day, bathrooms and changing rooms and a multi-purpose court for other activities, is now the home of a basic school.
Local boxing, Allen says, "is now at a stage where we have to cry for help and to save the sport we have to get rid of this board.
A DISGRACE
"Look at the state of the gyms. It's a disgrace. We have lost at least eight. Only Stanley Couch, the JDF, Smoking Job, Sav and G.C. Foster, to an extent, are in operation, and barely."
Allen, it would seem, has been silently campaigning to regain the position he once held as the association's head many years ago, but not so, he said.
"I have no interest in the presidency. There are a number of people in the association who are more than capable of doing a good job but they have demonstrated to me that they will not serve with (Jamaica Boxing Board of Control president Leroy) Brown and his gang or group or whatever they call themselves. Here's a list (of over 17) members who are willing to speak up.
"I am simply presenting the facts. They have successfully managed to bring the sport to an all-time low. Amateur boxers are not being exposed to international competition and the country can no longer suffer the indignity."
Jamaica, Caribbean champions for a number of years and consecutively on occasions, have not participated in CABA in the past three years, neither the Pan-American Games nor the Olympics, points constantly repeated by Allen.
"There is no growth. There are no competitions for the amateurs. What happened to the national championships and what of regular inter-gym competitions to keep the boxers active?
"Next year is an election year but we can't wait until then for them to continue to make a mockery of the sport.
"We need to have a meeting no later than March and we also need to get an audited report of the association's account which we have not received since 1999," he said.
Allen in the meantime vows to be a thorn in Brown's side.
"Brown should re-visit the articles he wrote. Then he said boxing was in good hands. He was more than careless with the truth and now it has come back to haunt him. I will continue to persist until we get this thing back on track," he said.
However, Brown countered: "This board has no intention of resigning because we have been given a job to do and we are doing it.
"We were elected for a two-year term and it was generally accepted when we took office that boxing was in its worst state ever.
"Anyone who expects that to change overnight is not in his right mind," Brown said.
Lashing out at Allen, Brown said: "We need co-operation. Allen is just interested in obstructing whatever progress we make because he wants the board to fail.
MISSION OF DESTRUCTION
"He is simply on a mission of destruction and all because he wants to be president again despite his protestation."
The poor state of the island's gyms was Allen's biggest grouse and to this Brown responded: "We know that the gyms are in a bad state and it is one of the areas we are focusing on. Our aim is to get as many of them as possible fixed up.
"We wrote to the Local Government Ministry and KSAC asking if we could lease the Desnoes & Geddes Gym and they responded saying that the entire Race Course complex was in government's plans for re-development soon so we are following up on that."
Regarding the inactivity of boxers: "We are working on getting the boxers active once more. The population of boxers who can get involved in international competition is not many right now.
"The previous administration was not able to get them to international competitions because of a lack of funds. We are currently selecting a team to go to Olympic box-off in Mexico in March and the team will be named shortly," Brown said.
