Olympic gold medallists Roland Schoeman and Ryk Neethling have settled their differences with Swimming South Africa (SSA) after the controversial stand-off between the swimmers and the SSA executive during the Athens Olympic Games in August.
The spat arose after Schoeman and Neethling, who had just won the 4x100m freestyle gold medal with teammates Darian Townsend and Lyndon Ferns, criticised SSA for its lack of financial support for South Africa’s elite swimmers.
The comments elicited a harsh response from then SSA president Gideon Sam, who said the allegations were ”baseless” and ”if they [Schoeman and company] want to swim for Uganda, then they must go”.
Speaking at a news conference on Wednesday, newly elected SSA president Jace Naidoo said that he and members of his executive have met with Schoeman and Neethling to clear the air and to plan the way forward for the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008.
”The meeting was less to do with the issues in Athens than planning the way forward for Beijing,” said Naidoo. ”We shared ideas on how to develop swimming in the future and how together we could achieve SSA’s objectives detailed in our four-year plan.”
Neethling was very upbeat about the new developments and said that the swimmers are very excited about it.
”I think that in Athens comments were taken out of context,” he said. ”If we all work together we can build for the future.”
Naidoo said the plan will get under way from January next year and will commit SSA to support all swimmers who meet predetermined criteria.
Funding will be in the form of monthly allowances, incentives for world, continental and national records and for medals won at designated international competitions.
Contracts will be signed between swimmers and SSA, which will ensure the financial well-being of the athletes for the build-up to the World Championships 2005, Commonwealth Games 2006, World Championships in 2006 and 2007 and the Olympic Games in 2008.
In return, the swimmers will have to make themselves available for limited promotional appearances with sponsors and be available for certain designated national and international competitions. Naidoo said SSA will set up a trust to support the programme and invite sponsors and all interested parties to contribute.
To show that the rift has been truly healed, SSA presented cheques to the record-breaking foursome totalling R337 500 for their outstanding performance. Each swimmer received R75 000, with Schoeman bagging an extra R37 500 for his silver and bronze medal exploits.
”It’s a good start and with this we can build for the future,” said Neethling of his windfall. But Schoeman was not as complimentary and launched a scathing attack on the National Olympic Committee of South Africa (Nocsa).
”We are still waiting for Nocsa to come up with their incentives,” he said.
”In Sydney 2000 the incentives for a gold medal was R1-million, a silver R500 000 and a bronze R250 000, but we are still waiting to hear from Sam Ramsamy. I wanted to buy a house, but that’s not going to happen. It leaves a bitter taste in the mouth.” — Sapa