YASMINE MOUTTAKI REASSERTS HER SUPREMACY IN AFRICA
She looks innocent, harmless and extremely charming outside the ring that one could mistake her for a beauty model.
But once she steps into the ring for a boxing match, Morocco’s star boxer Yasmine Mouttaki is tigerish in attack as she carries the fight to her opponents with vigour and authority.
South Africa’s Mathiba Thandolwethu and DR Congo’s Carine Nkelani are among Mouttaki’s latest victims.
Thandolwethu found herself on the canvas courtesy of a right cross to the jaw from the Moroccan that saw her being counted out for a KO defeat in the light-flyweight semi-finals during the AFBC African Men’s and Women’s Boxing Championships at Stade des Martyrs in Kinshasa, DR Congo in October this year.
“I lost my consciousness, I didn’t expect the punch,” said Thandolwethu after the fight.
“I didn’t even plan for a knock out win, it just came but I trained very well for the African Championships,” said Mouttaki who started boxing in 2007 in Casablanca at the Energique Club under the tutelage of coach Molay Ismail El Alaoui.
Mouttaki went on to stop DR Congo’s Carine Nkelani in the second round of their final encounter to win her third gold medal and the second one in a row in the African Championships.
Now she’s aiming to equal the record of compatriot Khadija Mardi, DR Congo’s Pita Kabeji and Kenya’s Philip Waruinge of winning three consecutive gold medal in the African Championships.
Mouttaki first won flyweight gold medal in the 2017 African Championships in Congo Brazzaville, the first time female boxers competed in one championships in this most prestigious African boxing tournament. Her second gold medal was in 2023 in Yaounde, Cameroon in the minimum weight class.
Kickboxing was Mouttaki’s favourite discipline initially, venturing into the sport in 2007 but the same year she switched to boxing, making her debut for the national team at an international tournament in Germany in 2014.
“My aunt inspired me to take up boxing, and so far I don’t regret because I’m living off boxing now, I’ve no other job,” says the 27-year-old Mouttaki whose highpoint was at the 2023 World Championships in New Delhi, India, where she won a bronze medal after losing to Mongolia’s Altantsetseg Lutsaikhan in the semi-finals to join compatriot and world champion Khadija Mardi, Mozambican duo Alcinda Dos Santos and Rady Gramane, Algerians Imane Khelif and Ichrak Chaib as the only African female boxers to have so far medalled in the World Championships.
“I felt great winning bronze in India, it’s been my ambition to win a medal at that level,” says Mouttaki who is one of Africa’s most beautiful female boxers but for the quietly spoken and humble Moroccan boxer, beauty is secondary in the squared circle.
“The beauty is in the inside not from the outside, it’s the courage that matters most in boxing not the beauty,” says Mouttaki, adding, “like any boxer of course I do shield myself from face punches.”
Who’s the toughest boxer she has met so far? I ask Mouttaki.
“Mmmmh toughest fighter not yet, none maybe myself,” she responds with a sweet innocent smile.
Mouttaki’s rivalry with Algeria’s Roumaysa Boualam has also added a lot of spice and flavour in Africa’s women’s boxing.
The two have met five times with Mouttaki winning twice and Roumaysa thrice though the Moroccan boxer is disappointed by their fifth encounter in the semi-finals of the African Games in Accra, Ghana, this year.
“I wanted to fight but she kept running away and when close she was always holding me,” says Mouttaki who lost on points.
They first met in the finals of the 2017 AFBC African Men’s and Women’s Championships with Mouttaki winning the flyweight gold. Mouttaki beat Roumaysa again in the Zone 3 Championships in Libreville, Gabon, in 2019 with Roumaysa earning revenge by beating Mouttaki at home during the flyweight finals of the 2019 African Games in Rabat, Morocco. The Algerian boxer made it 2-2 with a points victory over Mouttaki in the 2023 African Olympic qualifiers finals in Dakar, Senegal. Both made it to Paris because all female finalists from flyweight to welterweight division qualified for the Olympics.
Mouttaki did however not fulfill her burning desire to win an Olympic medal as she was eliminated in the round of 32 by Phillipines’ Aira Villegas.
“I’ve not lost hope, I’m still focused on winning an Olympic medal,” says the Moroccan boxer.
