A three-hour meeting to sort out the axing of Olympic silver-medallist Hezekiel Sepeng from the South African team to Athens ended on Thursday with Athletics SA (ASA) CEO Banele Sindani saying: ”There’s always light at the end of the tunnel.”
But he was quick to add: ”As long as it’s not an oncoming train.”
The meeting at the ASA headquarters in Houghton took place between Sepeng and Sindani with both parties’ legal representatives present after the 800m champion and South African record-holder was dropped from the athletics provisional Olympic team for failing to adhere strictly to qualifying criteria.
Sindani said that there was no official response to the talks ”at this stage” and there was no official outcome to the meeting.
”They stated their case and at an appropriate time we will divulge the necessary information and if any decisions have been taken,” said Sindani. ”But I must stress that this is a very urgent matter and it needs to be dealt with expeditiously. All the parties agree on that.”
Whatever case Sepeng’s lawyer Elliot Wood presented, the fact that the matter is being discussed further could well mean that there is indeed light at the end of Sepeng’s tunnel — and not that of an oncoming train.
Sindani dropped a bombshell when he announced Sepeng’s exclusion on Tuesday.
The Potchefstroom-based athlete, rated third in the world, has strayed from the selection criteria that demands that athletes have to compete in their specific events in two Absa Series meetings this year, as well as the national championships.
Sepeng’s case could be strengthened by the fact that he did in fact compete in two Absa meetings, but he did so in 1 500m races instead of 800m races, before beating Mbulaene Mulaudzi in a cliffhanger for the national 800m title in Durban last month.
”Hezekiel has a real chance of winning a medal at Athens,” said Wood. ”It would be a tragedy not to have him compete.”
The decision to axe Sepeng was made after two previous warnings in which he similarly transgressed qualifying criteria before last year’s world championships in Paris. Before that he went missing in The Netherlands when he should have been campaigning for a medal at the Manchester Commonwealth Games where Mulaudzi captured gold.
Sepeng was the silver medal-winner at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and fourth in Sydney in 2000. He also won silver medals at the International Amateur Athletics Federation World Championships in Seville in 1999 and at the Malaysian Commonwealth Games the year before.
Mulaudzi threw up his 800m gold medal challenge at Athens with a world indoor title in Hungary in early March following his gold medal at the Manchester Commonwealth Games in 2002.
Should the case for Sepeng’s appeal have strength, the ASA board will hold an urgent meeting to review the situation. Should it meet, there’s hope for Sepeng. If it doesn’t, then the light might turn out to be an oncoming train after all. — Sapa