IPRC-South Basketball Club head coach Charles Mushumba will coach Rwanda during the forthcoming qualifiers of the FIBA Afro-CAN tournament due in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, from June 17-23. The coach was given the assignment after national team head coach Cheikh Sarr decided against traveling with the men’s team so as to dedicate his focus on preparing the women's national team ahead of the 2023 FIBA Women's AfroBasket finals due in Kigali from July 26 to August 6. Mushumba played basketball for the National University of Rwanda (NUR) in 1997 before he was appointed head coach for the university’s men and women hoops teams in 2002. He will be assisted by Yves Murenzi who currently coaches United Generation Basketball (UGB). ALSO READ: Rwanda to participate in Afro-CAN qualifiers Afro-CAN is a continental basketball tournament that focuses on promoting players that play in Africa. The competition allows national teams to summon a roster that comprises only two overseas-based players, while the rest of the ten should be based on the continent. The qualifiers will determine the teams that will participate in the Afro-CAN finals, a 12-nation tournament that will take place in Luanda, Angola, from July 7-16. Africa Zone 5 teams that will feature in the qualifiers include Burundi, Djibouti, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya (qualified), Rwanda, Somalia, South Sudan, and Tanzania. They will be competing for the lone ticket available ahead of the qualifiers. Meanwhile, Africa Zone 1 teams (Algeria, Libya and Tunisia) will play qualifiers from June 21-25 to determine the region's representative at the final round. The host country of this qualifier is yet to be determined. The FIBA Afro-CAN returns to action for the first time since 2019. The semi-finalists from the 2019 edition including champions DR Congo, runners-up Kenya as well third and fourth-placed Angola and Morocco qualified automatically for this year's tournament. The teams that have qualified for the tournament so far include Cameroon - winners of Zone 4 qualifiers and Mozambique, who clinched the top spot from Zone 6.
