Veteran promoter Bob Arum slammed the injured Manny Pacquiao for missing a planned rehab visit to his doctor and says he has no idea when the boxing icon might return to the ring. After watching Argentina’s Cesar Cuenca beat China’s Yang Lianhui to lift the IBF junior welterweight title in Macau’s Cotai Arena, Top Rank Promotions chief Arum responded angrily when asked when Pacquiao might fight again. “As far as I’m concerned he’s not an active fighter,” said Arum, adding that Pacquiao had “not been acting very professionally.”
Pacquiao, 36, had surgery in May to repair a torn right shoulder rotator cuff, just five days after his unanimous points defeat against Floyd Mayweather in Las Vegas in the richest fight in history.
But Arum, who has been promoting Pacquiao’s fights, confirmed the Philippines congressman canceled a planned check-up with his surgeon Neal ElAttrache in Los Angeles on July 4.
“Pacquiao was supposed to come over to see the doctor and for some reason he decided to cancel it,” Arum said. “So he’s not acting very professionally.”
Just days after he had been due to see the surgeon, the Pacquiao instead traveled to Indonesia to film a television advertisement and visit a Filipina on death row.
Mary Jane Veloso was sentenced to death in Indonesia after being arrested in 2009 with 2.6 kilograms of heroin sewn into the lining of her suitcase.
“We’re hoping to help save Mary Jane’s life, I think Mary Jane is a victim of human trafficking,” Pacquiao said after visiting the single mother of two in Wirogunan prison in Java.
But Arum insisted that the former eight-division champion’s priority should have been to return to Los Angeles for an appointment with his surgeon to decide on his rehabilitation program.
“When you have an operation like that you’ve got to get into rehab. You’ve got to get the doctor to look at it and to guide you as to the kind of rehab that you’ve got to do,” the promoter said.
“He’s a grown man and he makes his own decisions but as far as I’m concerned he’s not an active fighter.”
Mayweather has since been stripped of the WBO welterweight belt he won for beating Pacquiao, after he failed to meet a deadline to pay a US$200,000 (HK$1.56 million) sanctioning fee for the fight.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
