IT is a little unfortunate that the most enduring conflation of politics and pugilism was made by Idi Amin. “Boxing is like politics you try to knock out your opponents,” said the butcher of Uganda, famously photographed by the late Monte Fresco as he engaged in mock fisticuffs with Ian Wooldridge.
Such wisdom has more recently been tested by Manny Pacquiao, who has embraced public service in his native Philippines with the ardour one might expect of a figure anointed by his people as a semi-deity. And yet it is Ukraine’s Vitali Klitschko, who, at 42, confirmed this week that he had all but turned his back on the ring, who could savour the greatest success in a very different form of canvassing.
There is nothing like the noble art, it seems, for affirming one’s suitability for the highest office. For Klitschko’s audacious move to oppose President Viktor Yanukovych in urging closer ties with the European Union is no mere stunt. Close observers of the febrile machinations in Kiev are convinced that the elder Klitschko brother, victorious in 45 of 47 fights besides his controversial defeat against Lennox Lewis a decade ago, possesses the gravitas to prevail in the 2015 presidential race. In a country starkly divided between the aspirational Orange revolutionaries who swept to power in 2004 and the Russian-speaking, blue-collar Yanukovych advocates in the east, Klitschko has the trappings of global celebrity necessary to span both camps.
“He is not corrupted,” Taras Berezovets, a leading political strategist, told Time magazine. “Klitschko is probably the single candidate who can bridge the two parts of Ukraine.” It is tempting to hold a rather jaundiced view of boxers with a political bent, given that even Pacquiao has struggled to convert his kudos into results of any electoral significance. As a representative for Sarangani province, he has faced fierce criticism for his poor attendance record at debates, with one congressman describing Pacquiao’s designs upon the Filipino presidency in 2016 as a “big joke”.
Klitschko, however, never fails to be taken seriously, either by dint of his 41 professional knockouts or his formidable extra-curricular qualifications. He is fluent in both English and German, enabling a constructive acquaintance with Western diplomats such as Victoria Nuland, the US Assistant Secretary of State who travelled to Kiev last week to hand out bread and biscuits to protesters in a sub-zero Independence Square. He also holds the equivalent of a doctorate from Kiev’s National University of Physical Fitness and Sport.
The one handicap, familiar to boxers as a breed, is Klitschko’s tendency to lapse into the lumpen rhetoric of the weigh-in. Under rigorous inquisition as to how exactly he intended to elicit concessions from the autocrat Yanukovych, he replied: “The president and the government pretend to put a brave face on their bad game. In boxing, this is not possible. If you have a bad game, you end up with a bad face.”
It was hardly a speech worthy of Cicero. But Klitschko is adamant that he will not deviate from his chosen transition, perhaps deriving confidence from the knowledge that a boxer’s path to the ballot box is a well-trodden one.
Lord Moynihan, former sports minister and chairman of the British Olympic Association, won a boxing blue at Oxford before he pursued his own seat of power. Alexis ‘Explosive Thin Man’ Arguello, by common consent the finest junior lightweight of all time, likewise became active in Nicaraguan politics following his retirement, becoming mayor of Managua in 2008 before being found dead at his home seven months later, in what was believed to be suicide.
There are even more exalted examples. Theodore Roosevelt boxed at Harvard, even going so far as to have a ring installed within the White House, where he memorably sparred with former heavyweight champion John Sullivan. Hard-as-oak senator John McCain, similarly, did not acquire his reputation for resilience without a thorough grounding in left hooks and right-arm jabs. He was swiftly recognised as a standout boxing talent at the US Naval Academy, cutting a swathe through the lightweight division. The same passion was manifested throughout a 25-year Senate career, during which he helped draft legislation as the Muhammad Ali boxing reform act.
From Sebastian Coe to George Weah, sport and politics have become interwoven in the richest of webs. But as the sternest preparation for a second life in office, boxing seems an unimpeachable choice.
Boxing
