Boxing shame

For six months, a group of five boys from a private Tahitian boxing club and Cook Island boxers have been looking forward to competing against each other in a small tournament, designed as a training exercise for the two teams. The tournament was to be held this Saturday. However, due to a series of mishaps and poor communication, this no longer looks likely to go ahead.
On Monday morning of this week, Trish Barton, Secretary/Treasurer of the Cook Islands Amateur Boxing Association (CIABA) made the call to cancel the tournament. This came on the recommendation of Keith Walker of the Oceania Boxing Federation. The decision came about due to complaints from the Tahitian Boxing Federation who are affiliated to Oceania and the International Boxing Association (IABA) who stated that as the Tahitian boxing team who travelled to the Cook Islands is not a part of the Federation, they shouldn’t be allowed to compete.
Despite the decision to cancel the tournament being made on Monday morning, the Tahitian boxers did not find out the news until later that evening, when it was much too late to do anything about the 11 airfares that they had already paid in order to travel to the Cook Islands. When they arrived at the airport, no-one from the CIABA Executive was present to meet them only the National Coach Tom Marsters.
With the tournament cancelled, there was also no mode of transportation for the team, and they were left without accommodation. They were taken by Tom to his house, and later on in the day, Tom was able to arrange for them to stay at the Rakahanga Hostel. However, the price of accommodation and living expenses for the week that they’re in Rarotonga should have been covered by the Cook Island Boxing Association. Now, the Tahitian team has to pay for all of this out of their own pockets. “We only brought a limited amount of money with us,” said Nooroa Arama, a Cook Islander living in Tahiti who travelled with the team.
The treatment towards the team has left them very disappointed in how things have turned out, and upset that this had all been left until the last minute. The Tahitian boys, ranging in age from 14 to 19 years old, are also very disappointed that they are unable to fight this weekend, and prior to the news, had been extremely excited for the upcoming tournament. “I’m quite ashamed of the Cook Island’s behavior,” said Tom Marsters.
Neither Tupou Faireka, president ofCIABA , or Navy Eptai, vice president, have been to see the team to explain or appease the situation. Faireka was out of the country and Epati was unwilling to comment.
In the meantime, until their flight home, the team is training and practicing hard every day.

By Piakura Tiraa-Passfield

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