Renowned boxing financier, Henry Manly-Spain says under-fire referee/judge, Roger Barnor cannot be coerced to apologise for what he didn’t do, stating emphatically that the experienced ring official never insulted his person to warrant any request for forgiveness.

Referee Barnor has just concluded serving a 4-fight night’s ban imposed by the Ghana Boxing Authority (GBA) for a judged poor officiating during the WBA Pan-Africa Junior Lightweight contest between Ghana’s Emmanuel Tagoe and Filipino, Ronald Pontillas in Accra back on April 26.

The GBA further ordered Roger Barnor to apologise to boxing legend, Azumah Nelson as well as Mr. Manly-Spain who he “unfairly castigated” in radio interviews for their post fight comments.

But Manly-Spain, President of the Golden Concepts International syndicate says there is no need for Referee Barnor to say sorry because the ring official did not insult or criticize him and has admonished the GBA to do a thorough investigation into such issues before coming out with a verdict.

“I was so surprised when I received the letter suspending Roger Barnor because he had not insulted me in any way. Even though I criticized in the papers that he didn’t do well, he didn’t respond to my criticism. He never mentioned me, he never called my name and he didn’t say anything about me,” Manly-Spain told the Boxing In Ghana newspaper exclusively.

The Golden Concepts chief continued: “The GBA also never called me on the issue to confirm directly from myself. Whatever it was, mere hearsay or whatever, they should have consulted me before going ahead to punish the supposed offender.”