‘West Africa has won’ as nations gather for Brotherhood Tournament in Burkina Faso

Young athletes from four neighbouring countries in West Africa demonstrated the power of collective intent as they gathered for the first edition of the Brotherhood Tournament in August 2019.

Athletes aged from eight to 18 from Mali, Niger, Togo and host nation Burkina Faso competed in the historic competition, which had its origins in a memorandum of understanding signed by seven nations.

The Presidents of the Gambia and Ghana Modern Pentathlon Associations, Saikou B Jarju and Christopher B Essilfie respectively, also attended the competition, which took place from August 15-18, along with representation from Benin.

The successful event, supported by UIPM and the African Modern Pentathlon Confederation, will be reprised in Mali in 2020.

Sylvestre Zare, President of the National Federation of Burkina Faso, said: “To the presidents of the sister federations of Benin, Mali, Niger and Togo, signatories of the protocol, I would like to congratulate you for having answered present and thus respect your commitments.

“I would like to take my hat and make a big bow to the Presidents of the Gambian and Ghanaian federations who, despite their busy schedule, made the sacrifice to join us in celebrating our first edition.

“I would like to praise their contribution in developing a development plan for Modern Pentathlon in our sub-region.

“West Africa has won and made a big leap forward in promoting the Modern Pentathlon.”

Africa will host its first Olympic Games in 2022 when Dakar (SEN) stages the Youth Olympic Games. UIPM has appointed a working group to finalise the details of a New Tetrathlon format to be introduced at Dakar 2022. Modern Pentathlon (Tetrathlon) has been on the programme of every Youth Olympic Games since the first edition in Singapore in 2010.