Athletics Pulls Surprise Awards Victory
Calistus Kolantsho | Monday November 23, 2020 15:44
The event was held on Saturday at the Botswana Television auditorium.
Athletics was viewed as an underdog compared to Boxing that had the highest number of nominations. On the other hand, athletics had a tough year in office marred by injuries.
Sprint sensation, Leungo Scotch walked away as the biggest winner of the night, lifting sportsperson of the year award sponsored by Debswana Diamond Mining Company at the tune of P100, 000.
He also beat Rajab Otukile of Boxing to take the sport man of the year award to Maun. Scotch was also part of the 4X400m men’s relay team that scooped the team of the year award. Other contenders for the team of the year award were Bowling women’s national team and Special Olympics women’s volleyball team.
Scotch made history for himself last year when he scooped a gold medal at the 2019 African Games to qualify for the World Championships. There was also another stiff battle triangle between 400m sensation, Galefele Moroko and queen of the ring, Keamogetse Kenosi and Marea Modutlwa from Bowling for the sport woman of the year award.
Moroko pocketed P50, 000 from Debswana. She also wrestled the award to Maun due to her brilliance on the track last year. She was the first athlete to book herself a place at the Doha World Athletics Championships after her dazzling performance at the Africa Games. She has also qualified for Tokyo Olympics. Athletics coach, Kebonyemodisa Dose Mosimanyane scooped coach of the year award beating Lechedzani ‘Master’ Luza of boxing.
Botswana Boxing Association (BoBA) president, Thato Patlakwe brought boxing back into the game when he won administrator of the year award over Mothokomedi Thabano of chess and Ross Tebele of Special Olympics. BoBA was also recognised as the code of the year.
Maxwell Sechi also from boxing lost out the junior male sportsperson of the year award to Denzel Seetso. Another contender of the award was Bernard Olesitse from athletics.
Meanwhile, Refilwe Gabatshwane of Chess is the junior female sport person of the year over Karabo Kula of Taekwando and Boitshepo Kelapile of athletics. The non-citizen award went to Vinay Naicker of Taekwando.
The only woman in the umpire/referee of the year category, Dorothy Okatch of basketball emerged victorious over Abel Mataboge of softball and Emmanuel Kgaboetsile of badminton. The sportperson with disability-female is Gorata Malehaneng of Special Olympics and Glad Ketlaaleka also from Special Olympics won the men’s category.
BOPA journalist, Anastacia Sibanda bagged the inaugural WASBO special award sponsored by Sprint Couriers. The award carried prize money of P10, 000. Mosimanyane told Sport Monitor that Scotch deserved the victory because he had a great season. Regarding Moroko, he said the athlete had a good season, despite being marred by injuries. He said the two athletes would be in camp during the festive season to prepare for the Gaborone International Meet (GIM2021) scheduled for April.
“She struggled with injuries last year but she worked hard.
She needed something like this award to keep her going after missing out on a World Championships final due to injury,” Mosimanyane said.