Rift Growing Between The WBO and Filipino Fighters

By Ronnie Nathanielsz

The World Boxing Organization continues to bamboozle Filipinos not only with their dime-a-dozen regional titles but also fights for vacant titles and interim titles when there is a champion in a particular weight division.

WBO Asia Pacific head Leon Panoncillo who is based in Bangkok but is a regular visitor to the country because of the number of regional belts the WBO keeps manufacturing recently approved an interim title fight for the organization’s bantamweight title between Rolando Magbanua and Jose Cotta of Mexico.

Magbanua scored an impressive 6th round TKO when the Mexican’s corner three in the towel after the Braveheart boxing stable fighter hammered Cotta into helplessness.

We have now discovered that world-rated Z “The Dream” Gorres, the stylish southpaw from the ALA gym who is looking for fights to stay active and retain his ratings until the situation is cleared and he can get a decent title shot, will fight Mexico’s former IBF minimum weight champion Roberto Carlos Leyva for what has been billed as the vacant WBO Oriental bantamweight title.

While Magbanua was fighting Cotta for the interim title the WBO had already sanctioned the Gorres-Levya fight for the vacant title. To add to the confusion the WBO Oriental bantamweight champion Michael Domingo who won the vacant title with a 2nd round KO of Indonesia’s Rivo Rengkung  on July 26, 2008 and successfully defended his title with a smashing 9th round TKO over former world champion Ratanachai Sor Vorapin of Thailand , has apparently decided to relinquish his title to make way for Gorres so his stable-mate who is ranked No. 3 super flyweight can hopefully break into the top ten rankings of the WBO bantamweight division should he win the oriental title.

What is even more inexplicable is how Mexicans such as Leyva and Cotta can by any stretch of the imagination fight for an Oriental title.

The Games and Amusements Board which is mandated to supervise and control the sport and maintain its integrity does seem intent on exercising  its responsibilities and has allowed the WBO and some local promoters to get away with what amounts to re-writing world geography and taking Filipino boxing fans for granted.

But the Philippines is not the only country party to this charade. Even Australia apparently condones it.

On the same night that Magbanua was mauling a Mexican to win the WBO Oriental bantamweight interim title and Gorres faces another Mexican for the same vacant title, boxrec.com reported that Australian Lance Gostelow won a twelve round unanimous decision over Thailand’s Somchai Nakbalee to grab the WBO Oriental light welterweight title raising the obvious question as to when Australia became a part of the orient.

As respected lawyer and boxing historian Atty Ed Tolentino has pointed out these organizations exist mainly to milk promoters of sanction fees and it seems that  for Leon Panoncollo the more titles he can conjure up and the more the geographical realities can be ignored, the better financially for the organization.