50-man challenged to kickstart karate season

Innocent Kurira,  Sports Reporter
THE Zimbabwe National Karate Federation (ZNKF) will commence its first full season by holding a 50-man challenge set for the City Bowling Club in Harare on February 12.

ZNKF was formed last year with a focus to promote semi-contact karate.

The organisation is a splinter group from the well-known Zimbabwe Karate Union (ZKU) which has been on the books of the SRC for the past 30 years.

The newly formed federation released their calendar of events yesterday with a number of international meets on their cards. They kick things off with two local events.

The 50-man challenge will take place at the City Bowling Club in Harare on January 12 before the Best of the Best Open Invitational tour set for Gweru on February 26.

According to the ZNKF calendar, the international tours set for next year include the AUSC Region Five games set for Durban, South Africa in May.

Next up will be the Karate 1-series A competition set for Cairo, Egypt.

The World Karate Federation (WKF) Youth Camp is set for June while the association is also targeting to have  participants at the The World Games in July.

The other international tours on the calendar include the Fisu UWC Combat games  set for Ekaterinburg, Russia, in October.

The Under-21 World Championships in Konya, Turkey at the end of October will conclude the list of international events.

ZNKF was formed to ensure that semi-contact karate members comply with statutes of the WKF which bars its members from having sporting relationships with other karate associations not recognised by WKF.

The WKF which is the largest international karate governing body has given the go-ahead for ZNKF to affiliate with them while suspending the ZKU for failure to comply with the federation’s statutes.

WKF revised its statutes in 2018 and prohibited affiliates from mixing semi-contact and full contact karate.

Article 5.15 of the WKF constitution states: “National Federations are prohibited from being affiliated with any karate organisation not recognised by WKF.

Affiliates are also prohibited from having any sporting relationships with such non-recognised organisations or with any suspended WKF National Federation.

“Non-compliance with this prohibition would give rise to disciplinary sanctions.

Illegal double affiliation would constitute just grounds for disaffiliation from WKF.”
-@innocentskizoe

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