Rwanda’s Middleweight champion Vincent Nsengiyumva has his eyes set on turning professional. At 75 kg, Nsengiyunva is Rwanda’s heaviest champion since the country has no boxers above that weight.“With hard work and God’s helps, I want to be Rwanda’s first professional boxer,” said a boxer who has been taking punches much as he gives them to his opponents for the last three years with in Kimisagara Boxing Club.Having won his major contest during the recently held national championship, Nsengiyumva is convince he could go onto achieve better things including turning professional.The youthful pugilist who works as a bouncer at Sky Hotel said that being self reliant strains his training program and some how affects his mental strength in the long run. “I am disturbed by feeding and transport to and from the gym at Kimisagara but I have to work for what I aspire for. I will continue training to achieve my goals,” he disclosed.He expressed his delight for having landed the chance to play on the national team as the only approved middleweight champion after three year of rigorous training. However, the newly crowned middleweight national champion took off to appeal to Rwanda Amateur Boxing federation (Raba) to stop relaying on poor clubs that can not afford to cater even for their boxers’ minimum requirements not only in normal training but also during national events. Boxing in Rwanda has remained on the Amateur level 13 years since its inception partly due to bad past federation leaders.Nsengiyunva is among the 19 boxers summoned to the national team to start preparing for next year’s African qualifiers for the Beijing Olympic Games.The first qualifier is set for January 22 to February 3 in Algeria while the second is scheduled for March 23 until April 2 in Nigeria.Ends
