Namibian athletes Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi withdrawn from 400m Tokyo Olympics by World Athletics

Namibian sprint duo Christine Mboma and Beatrice Masilingi have been withdrawn from the Olympics 400m event page by World Athletics, their coach Henk Botha confirmed on Thursday.

Botha revealed that he could not speak about the situation in huge detail, having just received a report from World Athletics regarding Mboma and Masilingi that he still needed to go through first.

Mboma and Masilingi have been in scintillating form

The duo of Mboma and Masilingi have taken the athletics world by storm, putting on some top notch displays on the European athletics circuit this year in the 400m. Just Wednesday 18-year old Mboma stormed to the finish line in a scintillating time of 48.54 secs. That effectively placed her as the seventh fastest athlete in that event’s history.

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Not long after Mboma’s race and the worldwide clamour about her time from the Polish track meet in Bydgoszcz, she found herself as well as compatriot Masilingi removed from the Olympic 400m event page, an occurrence that raised people’s suspicions that World Athletics had deemed the duo ineligible to be classified as women according to the athletics mother body’s criteria.

The withdrawals of Mboma and Masilingi from World Athletics page raised suspicions

Suspicions were further heightened when both Mboma and Masilingi still appeared on the women’s Olympic 200m page. Masilingi who has a personal best time of 49.53 secs. Had also been setting the world of athletics alight with many believing it would’ve only been a matter of time till she started lowering that time, herself.

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It now appears that she won’t be afforded the opportunity to do so, at least not by World Athletics at the upcoming Olympics with Botha confirming Mboma and Masilingi’s 400m women’s status was indeed in jeopardy.

Coach Botha confirms

“Yeah, seems like the natural testosterone levels to high for 400m. They (Mboma and  Masilingi) may only compete in 200m,” a disappointed Botha said according to the New Era Newspaper.

The publication also went on to claim that World Athletics suspects that the natural testosterone levels of Masilingi and Mboma are too high to compete in the 400m and will therefore only be allowed to compete in the 200m events at the coming Olympics.

Caster Semenya also hindered by the same rule

Those are the same rules that are currently in the way of other African athletes such as Caster Semenya, Francine Niyonsaba and Margaret Wambui from competing in the women’s 800m this year as they have all refused to lower their testosterone levels using the birth control pills method.

Mboma was earmarked to be the favourite for the Olympic 400m women’s event after her performance on Wednesday, and it would be a complete tragedy for her and Nambia if she and Masilingi were indeed barred from the distance by World Athletics. World Athletics are yet to officially confirm these suspicions, however.