Athletics South Africa (ASA) is expected to appear before the National Assembly’s sport committee to explain its role in the Caster Semenya saga.
Democratic Alliance (DA) spokesperson Donald Lee said on Wednesday he had written to committee chairperson Butuana Komphela, requesting that ASA appear before the committee to explain its role in the debacle that ”has resulted in one of South Africa’s premier athletes having her privacy invaded and her constitutional right to dignity violated”.
”Today, after discussions with the chair, he has agreed to the DA’s request and, pending scheduling, will aim to call ASA before the committee in the next two weeks,” Lee said.
There could be little doubt that ASA had a case to answer for, from its failure to properly protect Semenya’s interests to the appalling manner in which it had failed to fully disclose its role in her testing and the amount of information it knew ahead of world athletics’ governing body IAAF’s cold and callous public announcement towards the beginning of this month.
ASA also needed to explain whether or not it undertook its own tests on Semenya, whether it did so openly and transparently, what it did with the results and whether it did everything in its power to keep Semenya herself informed and her privacy protected and upheld.
The DA would ensure that all these questions were put to ASA, and in particular to its president Leonard Chuene, ”whom we feel has a great deal to answer for as the person ultimately responsible for ASA and the decisions it has made”, Lee said.
Komphela was not immediately available for comment late on Wednesday afternoon.
Reports on Wednesday suggested that, if indeed ASA did act to test Semenya’s gender, they did so in a manner which could only be described as grossly humiliating and devoid of empathy or understanding.
Beeld reported that Semenya was subjected to humiliating tests in South Africa even before the gender row erupted.
”The tests took almost two hours and Semenya became frustrated and even angry over the humiliating nature of the tests,” Beeld quoted ASA’s former head coach, Wilfred Daniels, as saying of the tests carried out in South Africa.
Beeld said Semenya was ”bitterly upset” when photographs of her private parts were taken during the examinations.
”Her feet were in stirrups when the photographs were taken,” reportedly Daniels said.
ASA officials were not immediately available for comment on the report.
Semenya was led to believe she would undergo drug tests in South Africa, Beeld said.
The team’s doctor, Harold Adams, who has been uncontactable since the Berlin race, apparently recommended to ASA that Semenya not participate in Berlin.
Daniels has resigned amid the controversy, saying ASA duped Semenya into going for gender tests.
But ASA is standing behind its boss, Chuene, who is also on the board of the IAAF. He has maintained that ASA was in the dark about the IAAF’s tests on Semenya.
”After I challenged them [IAAF] to give me proof that they had informed us about the tests, they argued that they had told Dr Adams. But I told them he was not a member of ASA. I have now asked for a thorough report detailing everything so that we can probe it,” Chuene reportedly said recently.
But ASA’s website clearly states that Adams is South Africa’s team doctor, according to the Star. — Sapa