......Last bout ended in Robbery of Ghanaian boxer
Chicago, October 28 2007. Ghanaian Amateur boxer in the ongoing AIBA Boxing championship, Saraku Ahmed, suffered the wrath of bias officiating when he was glaringly robbed in his Middle Weight bout against Draskovich Bosko from Montenegro yesterday at the UIC Pavilion.
Fighting from the Blue corner, Draskovich started the first round on a better note than the Ghanaian . He lead 7:1 on points by the end of three minutes of boxing against the Ghanaian.
The second round started after the one minute recess with the Ghanaian, Saraku Armed appeared to have found an antidote to the Montenegrin style of boxing by out-boxing his opponent with quick and sharp left jabs and right hooks. Astonishingly, the Ghanaian was not given any point for most of his obviously scoring point jabs! It appeared the judges Pizarro Julio of Portugal,Jakubik Miroslav from Slovaskia, Abdelhadi Knyane of Morocco,Plowman Jack from Newzealand and Potdiyev Nuurmuhammed from Tajikstan conspired to award the well deserving points earned by the Ghanaian to his opponent from Montenegro. Judge Jakubik Miroslay is a former "countryman" of the Ghanaian opponent Draskovich. The Ghanaian lost the round by 2:3 points.
The third round of action saw the African Amateur Middle Weight Gold Medalist, Saraku from Ghana dominating affairs and had the opponent seeking refuge from the referee Kowli Jay Suresh from India who kept constantly referring Draskovich to the blue corner for his head protector to be fixed whenever the Montenegrin is in trouble from the incessant jabs of the Ghanaian. The third round ended in an astounding 4:4 draw.
The International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA) was expected to hoist cameras above the four sides of the ring to monitor the actions of the five judges to assist in resolving issues by reviewing the footage of fights that ends questionable like bout number 280 of the ongoing championships on October 27 2007 between Saraku and Drakovich.
Perhaps the worst case of scoring in Olympic Games history was at Seoul in 1988 when American Roy Jones was widely held to have been robbed of gold by judges voting for his outclassed South Korean opponent. Such was the outcry over the decision that the old scoring system was overhauled and replaced with the current one, where no point is awarded for a hit unless three of the five judges press a scoring button for one particular boxer within a second of each other.
How the five judges in this bout pressed the scoring button yesterday should have been protested by the Ghanaian delegation for the footage of the fight to be reviewed, especially in the fourth and last bout.
The fourth bout started with the Ghanaian, Saraku sensing he was losing on points and the opponent appeared tired, charged on Drakovich with ferocious left jabs followed by wicked and punishing right hooks. One of such hooks dazed the Drakovich but the referee interceded on behalf of the tiring Montenegrin quickly before a follow up blow would put him on the canvas. Rules of the Amateur boxing should have been employed to end the fight at this point in favor of the Ghanaian but not in this instance, when the referee and match officials are in the corner of the losing boxer! A quick right from Saraku to the left cheek of Drakovich sent him down on his knees with about 22 seconds to the end of the fourth round. Not even an injured left figure stooped the aggressive Ghanaian from pummeling his opponent with punishing blows till the end of the round. The score for the bravado of the Ghanaian in the 4th round was a 4:5 point loss to his opponent! Wow, what a day light robbery! The small Ghanaian supporters in attendance were joined by the massive crowd at the UIC Pavilion and booed the officials for the blatant robbery.
The Ghanaian officials must protest to this kind of officiating in the future. At the world championships in Houston in 1999, there was uproar when the Cuban team walked out in protest at the judging after Juan Hernandez suffered a shock defeat. Hernandez was later re-instated as welterweight champion but by then the Cubans had left the arena. Four of the five judges - from Bulgaria, Estonia, Mongolia and Argentina - were suspended for "gross and blatant divergences".
After the fight, Saraku had his injured finger on ice to ease the pain and prevent further swelling. The Ghanaian doctor accompanying the team did not even bother to attend the fight as required of him and treat the injured boxer under his care.
After the bout,members of the Ghanaian community took the team for a "lavish" Kenkey, Fufu and Abenkwa “session” at the residence of the President –Elect of the Ghana National Council, John Henry Assabill. Members of the team and the officials happily danced away the evening.
All five members of the Ghanaian Amateur Boxing Team were eliminated from the ongoing AIBA championships in Chicago. The Ghanaian contingent will leave the USA on November 5 2007 to Ghana.
