- Politician set to be new head of association

President of the Guyana Amateur Boxing Association Affeeze Khan will be voted out of office when the association stages its annual general meeting next month.

Affeeze Khan

The person identified to replace Khan is none other than parliamentary secretary attached to the National Sports Commission (NSC) Steve Ninvalle, inside sources told Stabroek Sport yesterday.

The sources said that the matter was almost a “done deal” and that Ninvalle had already received the blessings from his superiors including Director of Sport, Neil Kumar, and Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport Dr. Frank Anthony.

There are conflicting reports as to how Ninvalle came into the reckoning with one source saying that he was approached by some clubs and another source saying that the “directive came from the top.”

Steve Ninvalle

Contacted yesterday Ninvalle said “no comment,” in response to the question whether he had been approached.

Some persons closely associated with the sport are said to be in favour of Ninvalle whom they knew when he was a sports reporter attached to this newspaper, before he left to campaign with the People’s Progressive Party/Civic at the last general elections.

However, others are not in favour of another politician being placed at the head of a national association.

They pointed out that Anil Nandalall, who heads the Guyana Table Tennis Association (GTTA) has not done much for the sport despite the huge expectations when he took over from Peter Ramsaroop, another politician.

Nandalall, an attorney-at-law, is like Ninvalle, a PPP/C parliamentarian.

However, the GTTA remains cash-strapped and the association was unable to send a team to the annual Caribbean championships in Jamaica last December despite Nandalall’s ties with the government.

“It seems as if the politicians are attempting to take over sports, a source said adding…”Don’t they have enough work to do?”

Odinga Lumumba

According to Khan the annual general meeting will take place on February 12 at the Guyana Olympic Association building on Church Street.

Khan is apparently in the dark about this latest development and yesterday told this newspaper that he was unaware whether anyone would be running against him. But our sources said that Ninvalle was the man and that other names such as Presidential Adviser on Empowerment, Odinga Lumumba, former Commis-sioner of Police Laurie Lewis, and Francis Abraham, were being mentioned as red herrings. Since being appointed parliamentary secretary, Ninvalle has worked closely with football where he has been donating equipment and running off tournaments and the feeling is that if elected gear from the National Sports Commis-sion (which our sources say are in abundance) would find its way into the hands of the clubs.

There are approximately 26 clubs affiliated to GABA at the moment and only one representative from each club will be allowed to nominate persons for positions and vote at the elections.

Ninvalle’s nomination is expected to come from the Andrew `Sixhead’ Lewis gym. Of late the presidency of the GABA has been almost like a poisoned chalice with several high profiles personalities including Lewis, Bernard Dos Santos, K. Juman-Yassin and Marcus Ross holding and then relinquishing the post.

“When they lost Juman-Yassin and Lewis that was the worst thing that could have happened to the sport,” our sources said.

If elected, Ninvalle would join the astute Lumumba, whose experience in boxing at the professional level is quite considerable and who once headed the Georgetown Football Association (GFA) and Nandalall,  as parliamentarians, who have gone on to become presidents of local sports organizations.