WeeklySA_AdminDISPARITY: Intriguing policy of American sports authorities hiding their own athletes’ doping but denouncing Chinese for doping…
By Pascual Serrano
On August 7, the Reuters agency uncovered a serious complaint which has gone largely unnoticed in the Western media. The US Anti-Doping Agency (Usada) allowed several athletes it had discovered between 2011 and 2014 violating anti-doping rules to continue competing then without being sanctioned.
The excuse given by the US authorities is that it was part of a plan for them to act covertly and continue competing without being prosecuted in exchange for information about other offenders. USADA maintains that the tactic is necessary and permitted, and wants to continue using it.
Given these facts, the response from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has not been long in coming: “This USADA scheme threatens the integrity of sports competition that the World Anti-Doping Code seeks to protect. By implementing it, USADA was clearly violating the rules. Contrary to USADA’s claims, WADA did not condone this practice of allowing cheaters to compete for years with the promise that they would try to obtain incriminating evidence against others.”
In fact, “when WADA learned of this practice in 2021, many years after it had begun, it immediately ordered USADA to desist.”
Under the world anti-doping code, to which USADA is a signatory, an athlete who “substantially” collaborates in a doping investigation can request to have a percentage of his or her disqualification suspended after processing. But there is no specific text that says that athletes who have violated anti-doping rules can continue competing without being prosecuted and sanctioned.
The suggestion that this code “can be used to justify not prosecuting a case for years while doped athletes are sent back into the field as undercover informants to compete against clean athletes is obviously erroneous,” the World Anti-Doping Agency said.
Curiously, the relaxation shown by the US agency for the recognised doping of its athletes becomes excessive demands when it comes to athletes from another country, especially if it is the one that most threatens its dominance in the Olympic medal table.
USADA denounced the doping of 23 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for a substance called trimetazidine (TMZ), a drug that apparently increases blood flow to the heart, months before the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.
Investigations showed that the swimmers were staying in a hotel where traces of TMZ were discovered in the kitchen, which explains why they were inadvertently exposed and the result of that analysis. .
The World Anti-Doping Agency considered the investigation valid and considered that there was no reason for sanction. The incident was not made public at the time.
Some of those swimmers won medals in Tokyo and have competed in the Paris Olympics.
The United States Anti-Doping Agency accused to the World Agency of covering up the scandal and called for the organisation to be reformed and continues to air it four years later to discredit Chinese athletes.
It should also be remembered that two independent investigations, one by Swiss prosecutor Eric Cottier who investigated WADA’s handling of the case and the other an audit of World Aquatics, reached similar conclusions that there was no mismanagement or cover-up on the part of China and its athletes.
But the US Anti-Doping Agency remains unconvinced by the findings and has accused the global agency of mishandling the case and urged the US Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate.
And meanwhile, at least three American athletes who had violated anti-doping regulations were allowed to compete for years as undercover agents for USADA. USADA did not inform the World Anti-Doping Agency, as required, while there were also no regulations permitting such practices under the World Anti-Doping Code or USADA rules.
One of those cases was an elite athlete who admitted to having used steroids and EPO, although he was authorised to compete until he retired. This athlete’s results were never annulled nor was his case made public. USADA argued that making the doping violations public would jeopardise his safety.
In another case, a high-performance athlete had his suspension lifted by USADA, but without WADA’s knowledge.
Perhaps this policy of the American sports authorities of hiding their own doping and denouncing Chinese doping not recognised by world authorities is the result of a medal panorama different from that of 1984 in Los Angeles.
That year, the United States achieved first place in the world with 83 gold medals and China was limited to fourth with only 15 medals.
In Paris, both have 40 gold medals, which in reality, in the case of China, are 42, because those from Hong Kong, which is part of China, are counted separately.
And that’s with the United States paying athletes about R700 000 per gold medal, something that China does not pay.
* Pascual Serrano is a journalist and writer. His last book is “Forbidden to doubt. The ten weeks in which Ukraine changed the world”
Comment
HOPE GRADUALLY FADING FOR MOST SOUTH AFRICANS
Socio-economic challenges have plunged millions of Black South African communities into high levels of poverty, suicides and unemployment with criminals wreaking havoc kidnapping people for ransom and forcing businesses to shut down and threatening them with death if they failed to pay. Lack of parental discipline and monitoring has also exacerbated the situation following the increasing number of bullying at schools which have led to some victims taking their own lives while others dropped out of school.
The unemployment crisis has also led to high incidence of crime with criminal syndicates operating with impunity kidnapping people for ransom and extortion rackets targeting businesses and doctors’ surgeries. In Gqeberha, this has resulted in many of these businesses closing down because the owners cannot pay the amounts demanded. So serious is the issue that the national ministry of police this week deployed more policemen to the area to help combat the high levels of crime.
Kidnapping for ransom continued at an alarming rate throughout the country with the South African Police Services reporting 4577 cases of kidnappings for ransom during the third quarter of 2023, according to Wahl Bartman, CEO of Fidelity Services Group. The police statistics revealed that 3641 cases of kidnapping were registered in the first quarter of 2023/ 2024. While these kidnappings were reported in all nine provinces, Gauteng had the highest number followed by KwaZulu -Natal and Mpumalanga.
Another worrying factor was the increasing number of bullying incidents at schools which had resulted in some of the victims committing suicide and others bunking school. This was happening amid calls for School Governing Bodies to take these incidents in a very serious light and to actually report them to the police. Chairperson of the Parents Association in KwaZulu-Natal, Vee Gani, said bullying at schools should be treated as a crime. This followed a recent incident at Verulam Secondary School where a female pupil repeatedly slapped another in the face and even kicked her. The South African Depression and Anxiety Group, reported that there were 23 known cases of suicide in South Africa every day and for every person who committed suicide, ten had attempted to do that before.
Most people have lost hope that they would ever live a decent life in a country where almost everything was falling apart. While we call on the government and the private business sector to urgently resolve some of these issues especially the unemployment crisis – which is one of the root causes of crime in the country – we also urge parents and teachers to help instil discipline on their children both at home and at schools.
Failure to swiftly address the explosive growth of these incidents could result in complete disorder where students would now take over schools and criminal syndicates would operate with impunity because of the absence of law and order in the country. The commitment by the ministry of defence that they were ready to intervene and help crush the extortion syndicates in the Eastern Cape – to protect those who are at the mercy of these merciless thugs – would help bring some relief.
