DRC's Kalombo stops determined Okwiri in IBF title fight

Former African Boxing Union super middleweight champion Rayton ‘Boom Boom’ Okwiri lost his fight Thursday night against Emmany "General" Kalombo of the Democratic Republic of Congo in their 12 round bout in Sandton, Johannesburg, Gauteng.

Kalombo defeated Rayton with a TKO in Round eight, to become the IBF International Jnr. Middleweight Champion.

Okwiri now on [7-1-1] and who started to represent Kenya at 19 had vowed to make a meal of DRC's Emmany by giving him a boxing lesson, but he surrendered to Kalombo [16-1-0]  in the eighth round, citing an injury in one of his right hand finger making him unable to continue the fight, hence losing on TKO.

 ”I want to say thank you to my lord and savior Jesus Christ for giving me this opportunity to be a world champion. Am very happy and grateful because it was a great experience, it's not easy to fight a southpole because they have that awkward style of movement. The most important thing was to win,” said Kalombo.

Okwiri was aiming to become the first Kenyan male boxer to hold a major world title after Fatuma Zarika became the first Kenyan fly to the world top professional arena in 2016, when she beat Jamaica's Alicia Ashley to the WBC super-bantamweight title.

Last year Okwiri trained in the USA with Demetrius Cesar Andrade, an American professional boxer who has held multiple world championships in two weight classes, including the WBO middleweight title since 2018, and previously the WBA (Regular) and WBO light middleweight titles between 2013 and 2017, which gave him more confidence going into Thursday’s bout.

Okwiri, 36, represented Kenya at the Rio 2016 Olympics, before turning professional in 2017 where he won his first fight in Brazil against Russian Andrey Zamkovoy, before losing his second bout against Morocco's Mohammed Rabii.

The Kenya Prison Service Sergeant last fought in October 2021 when he knocked out John Serunjogu of Uganda in a middleweight non-title fight in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania before his latest loss.

Kalombo in last bout before Thursday’s victory had defeated Malawi's Chikondi Makawa in third-round TKO in Soweto, last year.