Pretoria - Caster Semenya, you proudly South African beauty.
In winning her appeal against the rules forcing her and other female athletes born with differences of sexual development to lower testosterone levels in order to compete, the double Olympic 800m champion displayed resilience second to none.
The 32-year-old has been in a long-running dispute with World Athletics since the regulations were introduced in 2018. She twice failed in legal battles to overturn the decision.
Semenya ran in the 5 000m at last year’s World Championships. She did not qualify for the final and said afterwards that the testosterone-reducing medication could endanger her health and prevent her from relying on her natural ability.
During her time in limbo she has been focusing on her running project that boasts 30 athletes in Pretoria, with branches in Limpopo and Mpumalanga.
In its ruling yesterday, the European Court of Human Rights found Semenya had not been protected from being discriminated against by the athletics governing body.
The decision paves the way for her to challenge two previous rulings on the matter.
While a final and definitive decision is still pending, Semenya has to be applauded for fighting for what she believed in and the manner in which she went about it.
Moments after the ruling, World Athletics said in a statement it remained of the view that the regulations were a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means of protecting fair competition in the female category.
Whichever way the final decision goes, and whether or not Semenya gets to compete in 800m events again, she will go down in history as the athlete who took on the discriminatory and draconian regulations in a typical South African fashion.
Pretoria News