The WBA on Wednesday announced that it will eliminate all of its interim champion designations — a move that will affect fighters like Daniel Dubois, Chris Eubank Jr., Rolando Romero and others.
WBA president Gilberto Mendoza had told ESPN Knockout earlier this month that this project was supposedly going to start in October. However, in recent days, the WBA has not sanctioned interim fights and has instead ordered unification fights between its champions.
“The plan is coming. We are not looking for popularity, but we are going to drastically reduce the number of titles,” Mendoza told ESPN Knockout at the time. “We are going to eliminate that flexibility that we had with the titles, little by little. … We are going to review the division with multiple champions. It is something that the public has asked for, even if we are not 100% in agreement with that change. I feel that with more titles, we give more opportunities, but I understand that the public is very important.”
Each fighter who is a WBA interim champion will be appointed as the mandatory challenger for the superior champion, although it will be done based on the number of champions in each division, according to an order the WBA Champions Committee will release soon.
At the moment, there are 10 WBA interim champions who will now, for the most part, become mandatory challengers: Dubois (heavyweight), Robin Krasniqi (light heavyweight), Eubank (middleweight), Alberto Puello (junior welterweight), Romero (lightweight), Chris Colbert (junior lightweight), Raeese Aleem (junior featherweight), Luis Concepcion (flyweight), Daniel Matellon (junior flyweight) and Erick Rosa (strawweight).
The move will help to strengthen the Gold belt, without the world champion designation. The Gold belt holder will occupy second place in the rankings and have a better chance to fight for the championship. This belt could be acquired through a tournament in which the highest qualifiers available, aside from the champion, will participate.