Tennis federation ‘undecided’ over memorial tournament

Rwanda Tennis Federation (RTF) is undecided over whether this season’s Tennis Memorial tournament will take place since the Ministry of Sports has not granted the Tennis governing body permission to resume competitions. Times Sport understands that sports federations in March submitted to the Ministry of Sports a proposal showing preventive measures which players will comply with during the competitions but no feedback has come yet. The Sports ministry has been hesitant to allow mass sports from resuming after a spike in Covid-19 infections in December when the national football league was allowed to resume. Some of the clubs were fined after they were found to have forged results of Covid-19 while the others did not implement directives that were imposed by the government. As a result, competitions like the Primus Football League which was expected to resume in March was put on hold until further notice while other sporting disciplines were also put on hold. According to the Tennis Federation boss, Théoneste Karenzi, the annual Tennis memorial tourney is part of the competitions scheduled on this year’s calendar and he revealed that the tournament would be the very first to happen this season as long as the green light is issued. “All Genocide memorial tournaments normally take place either in May or June, but our wish is that ours start in May so we have time to prepare for Liberation tournaments as well,” Karenzi said in a telephone interview. “It all depends on when the Ministry will grant us permission. The sooner it is issued the better and we will start right away to negotiate how early we can organize our tournament,” he added. A number of Tennis players, professionals and amateurs, use the annual Tennis Genocide Memorial tournament to honor players, coaches and supporters killed during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.