The country’s greatest boxers of 2008, led by the world’s No. 1 pound-for-pound boxer Manny Pacquiao and three other outstanding world champions, are set to be honored as “Boxers of the Year” in grand rites during the 2008 Gabriel “Flash” Memorial Awards-Banquet of Champions Wednesday night at the Manila Hotel Tent City.

Sen. Panfilo Lacson will be the guest of honor and speaker during the awards ceremonies which will pay homage to the country’s world, international and national boxing champions. The ceremonies will also honor outstanding amateur boxers and personalities in various categories – best promoter, best manager, best referee, best judge, best trainer, best fight, most promising boxer, sports patrons and posthumous awards.

Pacquiao, who is in the US training for his May 2 bout with Ricky Hatton, will be accorded a special award as the World’s Best Pound for Pound Boxer, having already received seven consecutive top boxing awards which earned him a place last year in the Elorde Boxing Hall of Fame.

The Boxers of the Year are world champions Gerry Peñalosa (WBO super bantamweight), Donnie Nietes (WBO minimum weight) and Nonito “The Filipino Flash” Donaire.

Major awards will be conferred on 47 international champions and 16 national titleholders in various divisions.

Pancho Villa, regarded as the world’s greatest flyweight champion of all time and the first Filipino and Asian to be enshrined in the Boxing Hall of Fame, will be posthumously elevated to the Elorde Hall of Fame. This will be the first time the country’s three greatest boxers in the last 100 years – Elorde, Pacquiao and Villa -- will be honored on the same occasion.

Lacson and the Elorde clan, led by Elorde’s wife Laura, will present the awards. Liza Elorde and ring announcer Ted Lerner will be the masters of ceremonies.

For the first time, amateur boxing will be given due recognition. Olympian and veteran Southeast Asian Gamer Harry Tañamor, the country’s gold medalist in the World Championships, will be the first to receive such an honor since the Elorde awards were instituted eight years ago.

An amateur competition between the Philippines and Thailand presented by ABAP has also been included in the boxing extravaganza which will serve as a side event of the Elorde Awards Night-Banquet of Champions.

The boxing event dubbed “Duel at the Tent” scheduled in between the awards presentations, also features the first women’s world championship ever held in the country.

Talented Filipino boxer Gretchen Abaniel faces Thailand’s rugged Nongbua Lookprai Aree for the vacant Women’s International Boxing Association minimum weight title.

Vinvin Rufino meanwhile will defend his featherweight crown against veteran Jaime Barcelona. Juan Miguel Elorde, grandson of the late great “Flash” Elorde will also see action against Ronilo Romasanta.