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The World Boxing Organization (WBO) stripped Filipino pug John Riel Casimero of his WBO World Bantamweight Championship. This comes after he failed to face his mandatory challenger Paul Butler twice.
The WBO’s decision elevated the Englishman from interim champion to full championship status. Meanwhile, Casimero has been relegated to No.1 contender status.
Casimero (31-4, 21 KOs) has not made a mandatory defense since taking the title from Zolani Tete in 2019. He made two successful voluntary defenses against Duke Micah in September 2020 and Guillermo Rigondeaux in August last year.
The organization said in its official resolution:
“The Committee unanimously recommended to the WBO Executive Committee to strip John Riel Casimero’s WBO World Bantamweight Championship Title for failure to comply with the conditions set forth in its Resolution.”
Read the WBO’s full decision here:
The 32-year-old was supposed to face Butler in a mandatory defense last December. However, he had to withdraw on the day of the weigh-in due to gastritis.
The fight was then rescheduled to April 22 but Casimero was taken off the card after he supposedly violated a British boxing board policy that bans fighters from using a sauna to shred weight. His compatriot Jonas Sultan stepped in to fight Butler for the WBO Interim Bantamweight title. Butler eventually won via unanimous decision.
With the WBO decision, Butler (34-2, 15 KOs) is now a two-time bantamweight titleholder. He won the IBF bantamweight title in 2014 but soon relinquished his belt after moving down to junior bantamweight.
John Riel Casimero’s manager went ballistic over WBO decision
Of course, the decision didn’t sit well in the camp of ‘Quadro Alas’ (Four Aces). According to his manager, Egis Klimas, the WBO resolution is “insane.”
Klimas, who also represents Vasiliy Lomachenko, promised to look closely into the issue.
“Let me dig little deeper into this, maybe we will find out something fishy or stinky to this story.”
WBO is one of the four sanctioning organizations that recognizes professional boxing world champions. The WBO, along with the WBA (World Boxing Association), WBC (World Boxing Council) and IBF (International Boxing Federation), are recognized by the International Boxing Hall of Fame as major world championship groups.
