The 'Thunder in Africa' event — when Hasim Rahman beat Lennox Lewis — made an SA boxing record

Today marks 24 years since SA showed it was capable of hosting what is best described as its biggest heavyweight world title boxing match at Brakpan’s Carnival City Casino.

British-Canadian Lennox Lewis and Hasim Rahman from the US signed to meet in the main event of the Golden Gloves tournament on April 21 2001.

The fight — dubbed “Thunder in Africa” — only took place at 5am on Sunday April 22 to accommodate Home Box Office’s significant US-based audience to see the match on what would be their Saturday night.

Lewis was the reigning WBC, IBF and IBO champion who had successfully retained his belts against two Americans — Evander “Real Deal” Holyfield (twice) and Michael Grant — and local contender Francois “White Buffalo” Botha and New Zealander David Tua.

Trained by International Boxing Hall Of Fame inductee, Emmanuel Steward, Lewis met Rahman, who made an impression when he ended the reign of Corrie “The Sniper” Sanders as the WBU champion at Bally’s Park Place, Atlantic City, in New Jersey in the US, where he stopped the left-hander in the seventh round on May 20 2000.

Rahman’s career was guided by his manager Stan Hoffman, who used the Nick Durandt Boxing Gym in Johannesburg, to prepare his charge for his biggest-ever fight.

Rahman did not enjoy SA support because he had beaten Sanders.

So, Hoffman roped in Durandt — lauded for his success in producing champions and shooting straight from the hip at press briefings — to assist in training.

Promoters Cedric Kushner and his partner, Rodney Berman, supported Rahman, who arrived in SA a month before the fight.

Lewis was doing a movie with Julia Roberts and other Hollywood A-listers called Ocean’s Eleven in which he boxed against Wladimir Klitschko.

Controversial promoter Joe “Master Key” Manyathi had announced that Lewis and Mike Tyson would face each other in SA on July 18 as part of Nelson Mandela’s birthday celebrations.

Manyathi claimed to be working together with Mandela’s daughter, Zindzi, in bringing the two boxing giants here.

Then, out of the blue, the Eastern Cape Boxing Commission suspended Manyathi for the balance of the purse money he owed from a tournament he staged in Welkom and the bout was off.

A source revealed that Lewis’s managers — Englishman Frank Maloney and Nigerian Adrian Ogun — came to SA to “inspect” the venue for the July 18 event.

They then met with Berman, who is said to have proposed the Lewis-Rahman clash for April 21.

Steward told this writer in an exclusive interview that Lewis respected and adored Mandela like his own father.

“He left the shooting of the movie and came straight here, unfit,” said Steward. “The mere mention of Mandela was just too much for him to turn down the fight.”

Steward cleverly forced a rematch clause because he knew Lewis would not win if the fight against Rahman went the distance. The clause meant that in the event Rahman won, his first defence must be against Lewis. Rahman signed on the dotted line.

Team Lewis stayed at the Kopanong Hotel and Conference Centre in Brakpan, while Rahman stayed at a top-notch hotel in Sandton.

Lewis’s lack of fitness was evident when he huffed and puffed after six rounds of sparring with Nigerian Franklin Egobi at Carnival City.

A few days before their fight, 43 people were crushed to death during a soccer game at Ellis Park Stadium.

That tragic event shook Lewis badly. He went there to lay wreaths, and his actions brought him closer to black South Africans who filled the 5,000 seater venue — the Big Top Arena — to capacity to support “The Young Lion”.

Lewis was ahead on all three judges’ scorecards after four rounds. In the fifth round, he threw a few punches, but Rahman successfully defended himself.

With 46 seconds remaining, Rahman pushed Lewis back. He was trapped against the ropes and could not evade Rahman’s thunderous over-arm right, which sent him to slumberland.

Lewis was counted out, and there was a deafening silence from stunned fans who had filled the arena. That is how Lewis’s reign ended at SA’s biggest heavyweight world title boxing match to date.

Some boxing fans say the WBA heavyweight clash between American “Big” John Tate and Gerrie Coetzee at Loftus Versfeld Stadium in Pretoria, on October 20 1979, was SA’s biggest because it was attended by 81,000 fans.

This was a record for a heavyweight boxing match in SA and one of the largest crowds in boxing history. The event was significant as it marked the first time black South Africans were allowed into the stadium, a venue traditionally reserved for white sports. 

And then, of course, there was the iconic “Rumble in the Jungle”.

That match between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman took place in front of 60,000 fans in Kinshasa in the then-Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) on October 301974.

Ali, who came in as a 4-1 underdog, dethroned the previously unbeaten, heavy-hitting Foreman via an eight-round stoppage.

Wikipedia notes that some sources estimate that the fight was watched by as many as one billion television viewers around the world, becoming the world’s most-watched live television broadcast at the time. 

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