Boxing promoter Ayanda Matiti, who is accused of using the Nelson Mandela trademark without permission to promote an event, had told Boxing SA (BSA) he had since made “adjustments” to avoid legal infringement, an official said.
Tsholofelo Lejaka, who was parachuted into the troubled regulator this week as BSA accounting authority after its board was disbanded by sport minister Gayton McKenzie, said yesterday he had followed up after receiving a letter sent on Friday by law firm Edward Nathan Sonnenbergs on behalf of the Nelson Mandela Foundation (NMF).
The letter, in possession of the Sunday Times, accuses Matiti of Xaba Boxing Promotions — a former Eastern Cape leader of the ANC Youth League and a controversial character in boxing — of “using the trademark Madiba and the Nelson Mandela portrait to name and market their “Madiba As A Boxer” event set for the Vodacom Dome in Midrand.
It was scheduled to be broadcast by SuperSport.
“Our client has noted that the event’s poster(s) is using our client’s Madiba trademark in the name for the event and using the Nelson Mandela portrait as the most memorable and dominant feature of the poster, thereby creating the impression that the event is sponsored, endorsed or approved by ... our client, when this is not the case,” the law firm wrote in the letter.
The lawyers said they had “already addressed previous infringements of its intellectual property rights directly with ... Matiti” in the past. “It is clear that Xaba Boxing Promotions has a propensity to use our client’s trademarks, without having been authorised to do so, in order to name and promote their boxing events.”
Lejaka said he had contacted Matiti who assured him he had made the necessary adjustments to avoid infringing the foundation’s rights.
Matiti, who did not respond to questions sent to him on WhatsApp, had yet to remove all his tournament posters from the Xaba Promotions Facebook page yesterday.
He is one of several promoters reportedly indebted to BSA, which last year stumped up the money for his Gauteng-based tournament as the provincial government funding had not been paid by fight time.
Many observers believed this was contrary to the regulations and laws covering professional boxing but were bent by the executive that completed its tenure at the end of 2023.
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