Nonito Donaire Jr. to square off with Mexican foe for WBC bantamweight belt

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

Nonito Donaire Jr.’s return to boxing’s world title stage is finally official after the World Boxing Council (WBC) arranged for him a fight against Mexico’s Alexandro Santiago for the vacant bantamweight belt.

WBC announced the latest changes last February 18, 2023, scrapping the originally proposed showdown with top contender Jason Moloney who chose to seek new opportunities for a different title.

It was supposed to be a Donaire-Moloney bantamweight title fight when the WBC ordered the top 2 fighters in the division.

However, the Australian fighter recently announced that he might be changing weight class but a specific update is yet to be released by the Moloney camp.

Donaire will now be facing a younger slugger in Santiago who is currently on a hot winning streak after taking three-straight victories last year.

The rising Mexican star took down Antonio Nieves, David Carmona, and Juan Ramirez Marquez in just a span of eight months.

His recent boxing wins then improved his WBC rankings to world no.4 and is looking to put Donaire on the list of his victims in the coming months.

On the other hand, Donaire is coming off a disappointing knockout loss to Naoya Inoue last June 2022 but later on announced that he still got no plans to retire from the sport.

The former two-belt bantamweight king is still eager to prove that he is still one of the top dogs in the division and defeating Santiago will put him back on the pedestal of the 118-pound division.

WBC will soon announce the fight date and venue for the Donaire-Santiago clash and is still finalizing the terms and conditions for the upcoming world title fight.