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The plot thickens
“Work hard. Be honest and trustworthy. Be above board. Care for people. Be a good listener. Be compassionate. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”
These words, verbatim, are from a Cape Media interview with Mr Kirsten Nematandani, new president of the South African Football Association, originally from Limpopo – from where Caster Semenya also hails – on what he considers the key to success of any South African sport administrator.
In the report, Adams accused Chuene of deliberately politicising and sowing confusion in the Semenya gender test saga, according to "Mail & Guardian".
The report revealed that when Adams recommended that Semenya be withdrawn from the championships, Chuene initially agreed.
Adams gave this advice because he thought that the gender tests might prove too traumatic for Semenya to handle, particularly without the necessary support of family and friends around her.
The other reason was that being tested at the World Championships would not give her enough time to consult extensively and perhaps arrive at a decision to refuse the testing, if she felt it would infringe on her privacy and personal rights.
Adams alleged that Chuene changed his mind the next day after consulting with ASA deputy president Kakata Maponyane and politicians back home.
One of those politicians was the controversial head of Parliament’s Sports Committee, Butana Komphela, according to "Mail & Guardian".
In the report, Adams asked: “Did Chuene consult with the ‘high-powered politicians’ to merely get an endorsement and political backing for his pre-conceived plan of getting a medal at all costs?”
Adams accused Chuene of “an orgy of lies” and “selfish interest to cover his back at the expense of Semenya’s welfare”. He described Chuene's decision to allow Semenya to race in Berlin as “reckless, short-sighted and grossly irresponsible”.
In parliament, Chuene claimed that he had acted to protect the athlete and he blamed the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and the media for Semenya’s woes, according to the "Mail & Guardian".
Adams’s report indicated that Chuene lied to parliament by saying that the IAAF had suggested Semenya should fake an injury and withdraw from the race, which he considered unethical.
Adams said the IAAF made it clear that Semenya could compete at the World Championships, on condition that she would be subjected to the IAAF’s gender verification tests in Berlin and that, if any unfair advantage were detected, she would be stripped of any medal she might have won at the championships.
According to a senior athletics official, Chuene explained to Komphela that he would do something "bad" and would require the support of politicians when he returned home. After Komphela realised that Chuene was in trouble, he spoke to ANC Youth leader Julius Malema, to attempt to squash the entire issue.
Apart from politicising the event, the ASA boss and his political backers also played the racial card in a thinly veiled attempt to divert attention away from the poor handling of the event by Chuene.
One of the startling claims made by Dr Simon Dlamini, chairperson of the ASA finance committee, was that Semenya’s gender was being questioned because her critics were jealous that she broke the South African junior record held by Zola Budd.
The report by Adams and the claims by Dlamini have highlighted the danger of using individual stars as pawns to score political points with the ruling party and the government of the day.
It has exposed the lack of integrity within ASA and also the efforts made by the ANC to shift the blame away from the poor management of Semenya by Chuene to the IAAF.
But the entire campaign has backfired miserably and has put immense pressure on another sporting body, the South African Football Association, and on the host country South Africa before the Fifa Soccer World Cup in 2010.
Amazingly, Nematandani’s remarks about the qualities that make a successful sporting leader, have given hope on the eve of the Final Draw for the Soccer World Cup on 4 December 2009.
The question about the role of the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC) also re-emerged after the leaking of the damning report by Dr Adams.
According to the SASCOC website, it has the responsibility of “looking after elite sport, and the management of Team South Africa taking part in international sporting events such as the Olympic Games and Commonwealth Games.
“Importantly, SASCOC is also the umbrella body for the national federations in South Africa, providing them with a voice and collective forum.”
The question, however, is how SASCOC is looking after elite sport, and how it claims to provide national federations with a voice and collective forum when it has remained largely voiceless and anonymous during the past three months of intense public debate and damning criticism about Chuene’s self-acknowledged lies.
In the absence of a strongly opinionated umbrella body that voices its ethical stance on questionable leadership in sport, the party political agenda has taken centre stage and has prevailed – largely to the detriment of South Africa’s sporting image internationally.
