Tanzania's most celebrated pugilist Francis Boniface Cheka (pictured) is shopping for an opponent from outside the African continent for his optional defense of his title for the fourth time. Cheka’s desire for foreign boxers derived from the dismal performances exhibited by Africa boxers he had met so far.
“I have yet to see any African boxer who has challenged me aggressively” says Cheka, the IBF Continental Africa Super Middleweight King” .
Francis Cheka won the IBF Continental Africa Super Welterweight Title for the first time in 2005 and vacated it the following year for other “less colorful titles” only to recapture it in 2011 and has since defended it successfully! He is the most celebrated boxer in Tanzania and the whole of East & Central African region.
His metaphor of the country’s name and status out pass that of many sportsmen and women before him as he has accumulated a lot of respects from various quarters within African boxing fraternity! This is one boxer who enjoys boxing and when he is the ring his body language connect with that of the spectators in the venue as they sing and cheers him throughout the fight punch after punch to victory!
Born in Dar es salaam and raised in Morogoro, Francis Boniface Cheka is a great boxing entrepreneur who know how to tilt the sport to his favor. He is so popular in Tanzania that youths emulate how he dresses and walk. Francis Boniface Cheka is larger than life as far as boxing in Tanzania and East Africa is concerned. He epitomizes glory and the success which come with prize fighting!
Cheka's investments portfolio calls for admiration in that very few sportsmen/women in Tanzania have invested to so many enterprises without proper formal education! He runs a string of business enterprises springing from plastic recycling factories to environment management! He is the role model to many young people in Tanzania.
And now, he is shopping for a pound to pound boxer from outside Africa to match his boxing caliber, saying that he is above the level of many opponents from the Continent! If you happen to hear him speaking for the first time you would compare him with a professor lecturing students. He is so organized in his life as well as in the ring.
Cheka is the only boxer who cannot take a fight if he is not well prepared not matter what the price can be. When preparing for a fight he secludes himself from all luxuries in the world, including staying away from his beloved wife saying that sex and wine are the greatest destruction for sportsmen/women!