THE local athletics federation (RAF) will send four athletes to the 10th Africa Junior Championship in Gaborone, Botswana.

The event will run from May 12-15 and the federation’s Secretary General Constantine Twajamahoro has confirmed that the youngsters have enough time to prepare for the championship.

The quartet includes Potien Ntawuyirushintege who made his debut at last year’s Singapore Youth Olympic Games where he clocked a personal best 1:52:72 in 800m.
The others include Egide Kayigire who will compete in 5000m and Theresse Uwamariya (800m).

Botswana Athletics Association (BAA) has announced that over 40 countries are in the fray.
The first edition of the AJC was held in Algiers, Algeria in 1994 with Bambous, Mauritius staging the last event in 2009.

Other hosts have been Bouake (Ivory Coast) in 1995, Ibadan (Nigeria) 1997, Tunis 1999, Reduit 2001, Garoua (Cameroon) 2003, Rades (Tunisia) 2005 and Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso in 2007.

There were 41 events in total, of which 21 were contested by male athletes and 20 by female athletes.

The last championship was dominated by South Africa who took home 22 medals of which 11 were gold, seven silver and four bronze. Nigeria fell short after amassing 17 (nine gold, four silver and four bronze).

Kenya, the only East African country to have won a medal, wound up third with 18 medals (four gold, nine silver and five bronze).

The African Junior Athletics Championships is a biennial event organized by the Confederation of African Athletics. It was first held in 1994.

Ends