On Thursday, with the affirmative vote of all its members, the Assembly of the World Boxing Association (WBA) re-elected Gilberto Jesús Mendoza in his position as president of the pioneer organization for the period 2020-2025 to continue the process of modernization that he has been developing in recent years.

Following the proposal of the election process in accordance with the end of the present 2015-2020 term of office, the full assembly agreed to exhaust the statutory limits and re-elect Gilberto Jesús Mendoza by acclamation.

The WBA has been working non-stop and has come up with an online mechanism, such as GoToMeeting, to enable its members on five continents to discuss different topics of interest to the entity, despite the distance. During the Assembly, the electoral commission, made up by Francisco Piña, Jesper Jensen and Renzo Bagnariol, was convened. Since no additional nominations were made for the position, the members were called to vote and unanimously elected Mendoza for a new term, who had a great performance at the head of the WBA in the 2015-2020 term.

The 10 voting members agreed to conduct the vote online this Thursday morning. Renzo Bagnariol, from Nicaragua, Gustavo Padilla, from Panama, Carlos Chávez, from Venezuela, Shivana Inalsingh, from Trinidad and Tobago, George Martínez, from Canada, Mariana Borissova, from Bulgaria, Francisco Piña, from Colombia, Julio Quintero, from Venezuela and Luis Pabón, from Puerto Rico, voted for the continuity of the current president’s project. In addition, 25 directors with voice, seconded the motion and gave their support to Mendoza, with the novelty that for the first time in history there was participation of Mexican members, Miguel Torruco and Alfredo Polanco.

“I reiterate my gratitude to all those who give me this vote of confidence, to all those who stick to the work plan of the last five years. There is still a lot of work to do. We will keep on moving forward in things like getting closer to the athlete and the systematic development”, Mendoza assured to all the directors after his ratification.

The president recalled the words of his father and president emeritus of the organization, Gilberto Mendoza: “I believe that my father’s word fits, we can do it, let’s do it, let’s do it together. This is how I have wanted to act. We must remain united”.

“I am thankful to you for allowing me to be part of something historical. It is complex, we have done productive things. Thanks to the doctors, the officials, the academy; I want to tell you that you will continue to be the pillars of my management. Now we want to put effort into IT, among other things, but regardless of any system we have, human quality and the people who accompany us are very important. Thank you very much to the directors. I have to thank all of you, you are very important”, Mendoza said.

The current President of the World Boxing Association was ratified thanks to the work he has done over the past five years. Under his administration, the WBA has had achievements never seen before like the creation of the WBA Academy for the systematic development of the sport, the approach with countries like China, Russia and Mexico, the transformation of the entity into a professional and amateur organization to make its contribution and help rescue boxing in all areas, besides the use of new communication tools to carry out the work efficiently and adapted to the times.