Richard Jorgensen is visiting Egypt for the sixth time but this time for a different reason. He's attending the 17th World Traditional Karate Championship in Cairo Stadium with the participation of over 20 countries “I am very happy to be in Egypt again as it is hosting the world championship for the second time after a long absence. Egypt held the first edition long ago in 1983. I am very proud of Egypt and the Egyptian Traditional Karate Federation headed by Ibrahim Al-Marhoumi who is a professional karate player and a member of the International Traditional Karate Federation board of directors.” Jorgensen said he thought the competition will be “marvellous”, giving a chance “for everyone to witness the real Egypt, the safe one and to dismiss what he hears or reads about the instabilities and disruption of Egypt. We have also met (sports minister) Khaled Abdel-Aziz who is willing to give a helping hand in the organisation of the event and willing to erase any obstacles we might face.” Whenever the word karate is mentioned it is asked whether you are talking about the World Karate Federation (WKF) or the International Traditional Karate Federation (ITKF). Is there a difference and if there is, what is it? This was the first question Jorgensen was asked. “The ITKF is the governing body for traditional karate worldwide but the WKF is the world organisation for general karate. They were recognised as two separate entities 30 years ago. They were supposed to unify together to represent all karate but the WKF refused this union. They wanted to have unilateral recognition with their karate.” Jorgensen explained that WKF has recognition from the IOC but that their proposal to make karate an Olympic sport in the Olympics failed three times. “This is due to refusing to unify with the ITKF. The IOC required unification back in 1994. WKF and ITKF were communicating together and an outline of unification was drawn up but WKF succeeded to receive recognition from Juan Antonio Samaranch, president of the IOC at the time, without unification. As Jorgensen recounted, in 1960 the first world championship for karate was held without a federation or a governing body. “In 1974 the International Amateur Karate federation was established. From 1975 to 1983 negotiations to unify the two federations started as each country had to send one team to WKO and one team to ITKF. “In 1985 both ITKF and WFO went to the court of arbitration for sports. “We presented traditional karate and WKO presented their karate so the IOC said they are both the same and that you have to unite. From 1986 to 1993 negotiations started again but in 1993 the IOC took away recognition from WKO, saying it must unite, so WFO agreed to unify and agreed to the rules set by IOC and we started working on a constitution. But the WKO never agreed to the constitution so we said it was enough to announce our new United Karate Federation and start applying to the Olympics. “We have tried to communicate with the WKF several times since 1994 but received no reply. We were completely ignored so this year we decided to get united with other federations which are outside the WKF, forming the United World Karate Federation (UWKF), including three disciplines: contact karate, traditional karate and general karate. Contact karate allows contact during playing which is not allowed by both general and traditional.” This new body is more general and far bigger than WKF. In April next the first World Cup for united karate will be held in Serbia while the first world championship will take place next year in Brazil. The difference between WKF and ITKF is that ITKF maintains the principle of budo, the holistic development of the individual. ITKF karate and competition is designed as a tool of development for the athlete. WKF depends on weight categories but if you look at the theory of self-defence on which the foundation of karate competition is based on, when do you get to choose your opponent in the street? Never. So you must be able to deal with every situation, every size of your opponent -- small, big or whatever. Weight category defines your opponent but traditional karate has no weight category. You must face whoever stands before you. “And this is what we will see in this the world competition held in Egypt. Even in female competitions it is the same. We have age categories for juniors, youth and cadets. It is different according to age and maturity of the individual, not his size. In ITKF competitions we have also synchronised kata and synchronized kumite which are the applications of the kata and the kumite. In WKF their purpose is a point system but in ITKF we are judging success or failure of the technique and how much power is generated. In general karate, it is only speed and points that they are after. They don't look at the technique. Nowadays, the karate of WKF looks more similar to taekwondo.” ITKF includes 70 countries as members and with the unification will reach 110 countries. Jorgensen was elected as chairman of the new body for the coming four years. Jergensen added, “I hope karate will be in the 2024 Olympics and I will fight for it. “I am also sure that the competition in Egypt will be marvellous as we were warmly welcomed since our arrival and each and every one is trying to help to make the event a real success.”
