Championship: Muaythai Federation Appeals For Support 

Muaythai Federation of Nigeria (MFN) has appealed to Federal and state governments to support the Federation to attend the forthcoming African Muaythai Mini-Championships. 
The Federation says  they have concluded plans to compete at the African Muaythai Mini-Champonships scheduled to hold in Cote d’Ivoire and Egypt, October and November respectively this year, but lack financial capacity to sponsor their athletes. 
President of MFN, Comrade Paul Egonu, made the appeal, yesterday in an exclusive interview with Tidesports, in Port Harcourt, shortly after he received the two invitations for the championships. 
According to him, MFN was prepared to attend all the competitions to make Nigeria proud as they have fighters (athletes) that can win laurels, adding that both events will attract 20 points that will be used for Africa and world rankings, that is TWG2022 to gold medal winners and TWG divisions. 
“ As Federation we are prepared and our athletes are also in high spirit to attend the forthcoming Championships, but our constraint now is finance.
“I am appealing to Federal and State Governments to assist us to enable our athletes attend the competition. 
“We are optimistic that our athletes will make the country proud by winning medals in the Championships,” Comrade Egonu said. 
The International Olympics Commitee (IOC) July this year in its 138th session in Tokyo, accepted Muaythai to be medal scoring sport.
Consequently, the International Federation of Muaythai Association (IFMA) has lined up Competitions to keep various associations and athletes  busy in preparation for 2024 Olympics. 
“ I want to say that hopefully Nigeria will make her debut in 2024 Olympics in Muaythai,” he stated.  
The President equally, disclosed that IFMA has also planned to organise Youth and Senior World Championship, in Birmingham, December, saying that the Championship would include cultural exchange activities and others.

By: Tonye Orabere