In a major coup for Golden Gloves, financial services provider FORUS has signed a long-term partnership agreement with Africa’s leading boxing promotions company.
Announcing the sponsorship today, promoter Rodney Berman said it was the culmination of weeks of negotiations and reaffirmed boxing’s standing in the SA sports community.
“I’m delighted. They have been a pleasure to deal with and see boxing as a vehicle towards growth. I’ve no doubt our great sport can help propel their business, especially in communities that need it and where, incidentally, boxing is so popular.”
FORUS, which is still to formally launch in SA, has offices throughout the world, including the Caribbean, Mauritius, Atlanta and Los Angeles. It is an acronym for Free, Open, Real-Time, Ubiquitous, Secure.
The business is essentially a payment gateway, offering digital currency for traditionally “unbanked” people, of which there are millions in South Africa.
There is no cost to consumers and yet FORUS opens myriad possibilities, not least for low-income earners who traditionally don’t have access to banking.
“We’re thrilled to have signed with Golden Gloves,” said Marc-Jon ‘MJ’ Voges, head of business development and sales at FORUS, which is based in Bryanston and also has offices in Port Elizabeth and Cape Town.
“This is relatively new for us, our only experience having been sponsorship of Chris van Heerden last year. We are prepared to learn and are in this for the long run. Our ethos is to help the underdog and empower business people, enabling them to trade.”
One of FORUS’ pre-conditions was that there be a development dimension to the agreement, which Golden Gloves readily agreed to.
Berman says he will be working closer with one of Golden Gloves’ favourite sons, Vuyani Bungu (now a promising trainer), and will also stage a tournament jointly with Kagiso Moleko and Simon Shila in Makapanstad in recognition of the sterling work they have done for their community.
Voges sees many parallels with boxing, whose participants overwhelmingly come from the hard streets.
“Boxing is close to our heart for this very reason . . . it is these very people we want to help, those who need it most,” said Voges.
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