One more title run is in Nonito Donaire’s immediate future.
BoxingScene has confirmed that the legendary former four-division champion is set to face Chile’s Andres Campos for the interim WBA bantamweight title. Their scheduled 12-round contest will take place on June 14 as part of the annual WBA KO to Drugs festival at Casino Buenos Aires in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
A June 13 show is also in store for the event, though fight details are not yet confirmed as this story goes to publication.
Donaire, 42-8 (28 KOs), will return at age 42 and on the heels of a near two-year ring absence. Campos, 17-2-1 (6 KOs), has been more active but will also move up in weight for the occasion. A 28-year-old from Santiago, Chile, Campos had primarily fought at flyweight before moving up to junior bantamweight for his past two starts.
Both of Campos’ defeats have come within his past five fights. In his lone career title bid to date, he dropped a 12-round unanimous decision to then-unbeaten IBF flyweight titleholder Sunny Edwards in a June 2013 DAZN headliner from OVO Arena Wembley in London.
Three fights later, Campos suffered a sixth-round knockout to Joselito Velazquez last October 4 on the road in Cancun, Mexico. He has since rebounded with a confidence-restoring win on April 12 in his Santiago hometown.
Donaire has not fought since a July 2023 defeat to Alexandro Santiago in their vacant WBC bantamweight title fight. He aimed to regain the belt he lost to Naoya Inoue 13 months prior in their three-belt unification fight.
The extended ring absence was not for a lack of effort to secure an opportunity. Among the targeted bouts was a showdown with fellow modern-day ring legend Roman “Chocolatito” Gonzalez for this very title at stake.
Talks surfaced after Nicaragua’s Gonzalez ended his own 19-month ring hiatus last July. However, for a number of reasons, the fight never came to pass, which left Donaire to explore other options.
The door to a secondary title fight opened for Donaire once Seiya Tsutsumi was downgraded from WBA bantamweight titlist to “champion in recess.” Antonio Vargas was elevated to full WBA titleholder after having previously won the interim version last December 13 in Orlando, Florida.
With a win, Donaire will be in line to face Vargas in a title consolidation bout and the chance to become a four-time bantamweight titlist. He has already twice set the record as the oldest fighter to win a title at 118lbs, first in November 2018 when he stopped Ryan Burnett to win the WBA title two weeks shy of his 36th birthday.
More than two years later, a 38-year-old version of Donaire turned back the clock in a stunningly one-sided fourth-round knockout of unbeaten Nordine Oubaali in May 2021 to claim the WBC crown.
Both of those reigns ended with losses to Inoue in separate unification bouts.
Donaire has also held major titles at flyweight, junior featherweight and featherweight, while he was a secondary titleholder at junior bantamweight. He is a shoo-in for the Hall of Fame three years from the day he decides to finally call it a career.
The KO to Drugs festival is an annual four-day event hosted by the WBA, which often includes two separate nights of fight cards. Its longtime intention was to establish a grassroots infrastructure for boxing throughout Latin America and to keep kids off the street and in the gym.
Jake Donovan is an award-winning journalist who served as a senior writer for BoxingScene from 2007-2024, and news editor for the final nine years of his first tour. He was also the lead writer for The Ring before his decision to return home. Follow Jake on and .