Matthee voted in as Board Member at Large

SASAPD’s Elsa Matthee has been further honoured for her service and excellence by being voted in a Member at Large at World Boccia’s General Assembly in Seoul on Wednesday (26th August).

Last year Matthee was recognised for more than three decades of voluntary service to para sport when she received an International Paralympic Committee’s (IPC) 2025 Classification Recognition Awards for her exceptional contribution to fairness and athlete inclusion in World Boccia. Now the South African was voted in as one of two new Board Members at Large. In offering her well wishes, the president of SASAPD, Jean Miggels, said: “Congratulations to Elsa for being re-elected as a Board Member at Large of World Boccia. We want to wish her well in her position. We are all super proud of her!”

Classification of the cornerstone of para sport and Matthee’s recognition reflects more than 30 years of unpaid service as a classifier, administrator and mentor, both in South Africa and internationally.

She has served as Head of Classification and Board Member for World Boccia, and her influence is seen across the community — many of today’s top classifiers were trained directly by her.

“You don’t do classification to get rewarded, but it’s an amazing feeling when they do recognise it,” she said. “I’ve classified for over years … it’s second nature, now,” she told World Boccia last year.

“It’s volunteer work, so that’s very important because you don’t get paid – you do it for the love of the sport and for the love of classification,” she said. “For me, classification is a tool that makes it fair for all the athletes to participate according to their abilities.

“It gives them the opportunity to be able to do something extraordinary, especially in boccia, where the athletes are more severely disabled than most sports. Classification opens the door to fair and consistent competition.”

Over her three decades of service, Matthee has helped shape the modern boccia classification system, ensuring athletes with severe physical impairments are properly assessed and placed in appropriate categories.

She has also been central to efforts to align World Boccia’s rules with the IPC Classification Code, recently co-authoring a comprehensive update to the sport’s rulebook. Matthee says the technical side of the role is only part of the story — patience, empathy and passion are just as vital.

“You need patience and knowledge, and experience surely helps in the long run to make the difficult decisions. But above all, you’ve got to love what you do because it’s all volunteer work,” she said.

For Matthee, the true reward of classification has always been seeing athletes thrive once given a fair platform to compete.

“The reward is when you sit next to the field of play and an athlete gets a medal or does well — to actually see that you had a part in that athlete’s journey to be able to compete in sport,” she said. “That is, in the end, my reward. It’s not about money or acknowledgement.”

Through her decades of voluntary service, Matthee has not only helped define modern classification for boccia but also embodied the spirit of fairness and inclusion that underpins the Paralympic movement.