Proceedings at the boxing event of the National Sports Festival (NSF), on Tuesday was suspended for over two hours following a protest that erupted after a bout between Ondo and Oyo states athletes.

The referees and judges had awarded the match to Oyo state but the passionate crowd felt the result was not a true reflection of what happened in the ring.

This led to a protest where chairs and pebbles were thrown into the ring with the entire venue hotly charged.

The timely intervention of security personnel at the scene saved the situation from degenerating with nobody sustaining injury.

Moses Osifo, Coach of Ondo boxing team claimed his athletes won in all the rounds of the bout and wondered why the match would be awarded to Oyo.

Osifo said the reaction was an expression of bottled up anger among coaches, athletes and lovers of boxing over the poor judgment of judges and referees.

He said awarding matches to underserving teams and asking people not to protest, was no longer acceptable as it was killing the sport in Nigeria.

He said his protest was genuine and clear to everyone while dismissing the threat to suspend him.

“They cannot suspend me because my protest is genuine, even if they do, we will appeal and people will see the type of decision they are making,” he said.

In a reaction, Abdullahi Masha, the Referees Commissioner said the decision of the judges were right and that there was no need for violence.

Masha however said that human error could not be ruled out in rare cases.

He said the committee would still take a decision on the action to take against those behind the protest.

“It is all about rush for gold, they want to take gold back that is why they are desperate, we don’t have this type of issues in championships,” he said