IABA vote paves way for Irish boxers to compete in LA
Ireland's boxers are set to compete at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics after the Irish Athletic Boxing Association [IABA] overwhelmingly voted in favour of submitting an application to join World Boxing on Saturday.
At an extraordinary general meeting [EGM] 116 out of the 117 clubs represented voted for constitutional reform which paves the way for international federation dual membership with the International Boxing Association [IBA] and World Boxing.
The IABA, which governs amateur boxing in Ireland, had previously been affiliated to the IBA.
The development comes after the International Olympic Committee's [IOC] executive board last month recommended the inclusion of boxing in the LA 2028 summer Olympics programme, having already provisionally granted recognition to World Boxing.
The IOC ran the boxing competition at the Paris 2024 Games after it had stripped the IBA of recognition in 2023 over its failure to implement reforms on governance and finance.
The sport was not part of the programme for LA 2028 when the schedule was first announced in 2022, the IOC having encouraged the sport's national federations to form a new global body.
World Boxing was launched in 2023 and now has more than 80 national federations as members.
The IOC said only athletes whose national federations were members of World Boxing by the time of the start of the qualification events for the 2028 Olympics could take part in Los Angeles.
In October 2024, the IABA removed all references to the IBA from its constitution before the IABA chairperson Niall O'Carroll last month indicated that it would issue a 'Letter of Intent' to join World Boxing which would then be voted on at an EGM.
'Irish Boxing has spoken today'
Following the vote on Saturday O'Carroll, said: "Irish Boxing has spoken today, and has chosen to be able to plot its own course.
"The removal of reference to IBA/AIBA in our constitution isn't about any one international federation, it's about clubs giving themselves the ability to choose.
"They've exercised that right for the first time today, voting to also affiliate with World Boxing."
O'Carroll added that the move would result in better opportunities for young boxers to plot their path to Olympic competition.
"The Olympics is the dream of every kid who walks into any boxing club – but getting there needs high level international competition.
"For the last few years, our clubs have been constrained in the federations that they can work with at a grassroots level on a club-to-club basis. Many of those federations were long-standing partners.
"Those constraints have now been lifted, and our clubs, as well as our national teams, can travel to any federation in the world to train and compete. It's a huge day for clubs, and for our federation."
Boxing has been Ireland's most successful Olympic sport, having won 19 of Team Ireland's 42 medals, including Kellie Harrington's unprecedented defence of her Tokyo 2020 gold at Paris 2024.
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