29 Nov 2018

Limitless Minds Chess Academy in partnership with Rock and Roll Chess Masters and Motif Chess Club, under the auspices of Botswana Chess Federation (BCF), will stage the 2018 Botswana International Open Junior Chess Championships this weekend.

The competition’s communication liaison officer, Keenese Katisenge said in an interview that the event, which would be held at Botho University in Gaborone from today to Sunday, was open to all national chess federations or associations, academies, clubs, schools and individual players from the age brackets of U-7, U-9, U-11, U-13, U-15, U-17 and U-21 open and girls categories.

Katisenge said Botswana Public Officers Medical Aid Scheme, Mascom Wireless, Botho University, Mamlathan and Associates, Khayelihle Guest House and Impression House had come on board to assist in making the event a success with some donations.

She said the total prize money for the whole tournament was P36 000, with winners of each category set to collect P1 000, runners-up P750, and third place finishers P500.

“As of today, a total of 180 players from Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe have registered for the event and deadline for registration was on Thursday,” Katisenge said.

 She said the opening ceremony is today while the closing ceremony would be on Sunday.

 She further said a new addition to the event would be the Chess for the Visually Impaired/Braille Section.

As Limitless Minds Academy, she said their aim was to take the game of chess to more people in Botswana and Africa through a ‘sport for all approach to sport development’.

“Limitless has introduced programmes designed to meet the needs of different communities within our society such as Chess for the Visually Impaired thus complementing the efforts of our mother body, being BCF and also in a way those of the Botswana National Sports Commission and sport in general.

We work hand in hand with BCF, which continues to be very supportive to our initiatives, to improve accessibility to chess coaching around the country through strategic partnerships,” Katisenge said. ENDS