Gennady Golovkin Set to Be Elected World Boxing Leader, To Steer Boxing Towards 2028 Los Angeles Olympics
Ex-middleweight world titleholder Gennady Golovkin is slated to be elected president of World Boxing and guide boxing as it prepares for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.
The boxing legend, who earned a silver medal in Athens in 2004 and achieved the most world title defences in middleweight history, is the only presidential candidate endorsed by the sport’s autonomous selection committee for the upcoming vote. As a result, he will assume leadership of World Boxing, which was established as the authority for amateur Olympic boxing recently.
This position was previously occupied by the former international boxing body, but it was banished by the IOC in 2023 following a string of judging, corruption and governance scandals.
In his platform, the boxing veteran, whose initial term runs until 2027, vowed to rebuild confidence in the sport and ensure boxing’s future in the Olympic lineup, starting with the Los Angeles 2028.
“As an amateur, I earned with pride a silver medal at the 2004 Athens Olympics, representing not only Kazakhstan but the values of fair play and discipline that characterize the sport,” he wrote. “As a professional, I won numerous world titles, recognized for my honesty, sportsmanship, and dedication to fair play.
“I am committed to improving oversight, ensuring financial transparency, advancing tech solutions to ensure impartial scoring, and creating more chances for athletes of all genders in every region of the world.”
The IOC organized the boxing tournaments itself at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and the Paris 2024 Games. However, after last year’s Olympics were marred by disputes about gender eligibility, it said it needed a fresh collaborator by the 2028 Olympics.
In the month of February, it officially recognized the new boxing federation, which then ran the 2025 world championships in the city of Liverpool. For that event, the organization implemented compulsory gender verification, to assess qualification of male and female athletes, a step which the Olympic committee is also considering for LA 2028.
