“Rules on nationality changes must be reviewed,” said Hamad Kalkaba Malboum, head of the African athletics federation which is meeting in the Senegalese capital.
“What’s happening in international competitions is troubling everyone.” There have been a host of east African athletes competing for other countries, many in the Gulf but also Turkey and even the United States. Morocco and Nigeria-born athletes are also seen to be running for other countries.
Turkey performed strongly at July’s European Championship in Amsterdam, finishing fourth, but nine of the country’s 12 medals were won by foreigners. The most recent stand-out example is Kenyan Ruth Jebet.
Jebet won Bahrain’s first ever Olympic medal when she claimed gold in the women’s 3000m steeplechase at the Rio Games and then went on to set a new world record at the Diamond League meet in Paris.
“We want to make stricter the rules on transfers of allegiance,” IAAF president Sebastian Coe said at the time, with Jebet explaining she quit Kenya five years ago for “animal health” studies.
France’s IAAF Council member Bernard Amsalem has been charged with investigating the trade in athletes.
“We’ll go looking for the athletes in mainly Kenya, but also Ethiopia, Morocco, Jamaica a little bit and Nigeria increasingly for the sprinters,” he said. “Poor countries, in difficulty, it’s easier to turn an athlete from those countries by giving them a lot of money.”
Jebet’s father gave the game away when she was honoured in Kenya for her Olympic gold, thanking her for enabling him to buy a house and cattle.
According to IAAF rules, an athlete who has competed for one country can only transfer allegiance to another after three years, although intra-federation agreements often see that period shortened.
