News24.com | Caster Semenya: Athletics SA taking legal advice on 'highly discriminatory' new World Athletics rules

Caster Semenya. (Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images for World Athletics)

Potchefstroom

• Athletics SA said it is taking legal advice regarding the latest World Athletics ruling that bars Caster Semenya from competing without hormone suppressors.
• World Athletics last week announced new rules banning all trans athletes from competing in the women’s category and forcing DSD athletes to lower their testosterone levels.
• Semenya appeared calm at the ASA National Championships in Potchefstroom on Thursday, despite the storm threatening her career.

Athletics South Africa (ASA) said in a statement on Thursday it is considering its legal options following global athletics body World Athletics' release of new rules around trans athletes and athletes with differences of sexual development (DSD). 

The South African governing body said it would, in the meantime, cooperate with the new rules that ban all trans athletes from competing in the women’s category and force DSD athletes to lower their testosterone levels to below 2.5 nmol/L (nanomoles per litre of blood) for 24 months across all women’s events in order to be able to compete.

However, ASA said the rules were "highly discriminatory". 

READ | Will Caster Semenya compete (without suppressors) one last time at SA Champs?

"Whilst ASA is considering the new regulations and taking legal advice thereon, in the interim, it is duty bound to adhere to and implement the new regulations and as such cannot allow any of those affected athletes to participate in any world ranking competition or international events in contravention of the said regulations," ASA’s statement said.

"In this regard, ASA is still awaiting the outcome of the legal challenge lodged against the regulations which is still to be heard and decided upon by the European Court of Human Rights.

"ASA also reaffirms its gratitude to the government of SA, UNHRC, the WHO, World Medical Association, different governments around the world, global icons and fellow national federations that have continued to rally behind this noble course of supporting the challenge against these highly discriminatory regulations."

SA’s affected athlete, Caster Semenya, was in attendance at the ASA National Championship in Potchefstroom on Thursday, but did not participate in any events on the first day of the event. 

World Athletics' new rules come into effect on Friday.

Semenya spent the entire day in the stands, walking around and talking to close friends in track and field, seemingly unbothered by the administrative storm that is threatening to end her career.

The 32-year-old vehemently refuses to take medication to lower her natural testosterone, which she had done in the past, and said the hormone suppressors "takes the soul out of my body".

That stance has put her future participation in the sport in doubt, although she has taken her fight to the European Court of Human Rights after failing to overturn World Athletics’ current embargo at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and the Swiss Federal Court.

Young Namibian sprinter Beatrice Masilingi (19) who is caught in the same fight as Semenya, competed in a 200m exhibition race at the NWU McArthur Stadium, but pulled up injured after a hamstring tweak.

Masilingi and her compatriot, Christine Mboma, dropped down to the 200m and 100m races after the current ruling barred DSD athletes from the 400m (to the mile).

Semenya, who is a two-time 800m Olympic gold medallist, initially took her chances in the 200m before exploring the 5 000km, where she participated in the World Athletics Cross Country Championships in Bathurst, Australia, in February.

But, with the new World Athletics rules kicking in on day 2 of the SA National Championships, that is on Friday, 31 March, it is unlikely that South African fans will see her participate until her Human Rights Court hearing concludes.