{"id":1815946,"date":"2021-07-28T22:09:37","date_gmt":"2021-07-28T22:09:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/?p=1815946"},"modified":"2021-07-28T22:09:37","modified_gmt":"2021-07-28T22:09:37","slug":"tokyo-olympics-nigerias-medal-hope-dimmed-10-nigerians-athletics-disqualified-says-aiu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/tokyo-olympics-nigerias-medal-hope-dimmed-10-nigerians-athletics-disqualified-says-aiu\/","title":{"rendered":"Tokyo Olympics: Nigeria\u2019s medal hope dimmed, 10 Nigerians athletics disqualified \u2013says AIU"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>The chances of Nigeria winning medals in the ongoing Tokyo 2020 Olympics has further be dimmed as 10 Nigerians were amongst the 20 athletes declared ineligible to participate in the athletics events of the Summer Games.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>The Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) of World Athletics, the sport\u2019s world governing body, said in a statement on Monday that the athletes contravened Rule 15 of World Athletics\u2019 Anti-Doping Rules.<\/p>\n<p>The statement however did not contain the athletes\u2019 names.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1815947\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1815947\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1815947\" src=\"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/Nigera-team-to-Tokyo-2020-Olympics-300x145.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"145\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1815947\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nigeria team to Tokyo 2020 Olympics<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cThe rule states that athletes from \u2018Category A\u2019 federations must meet the minimum testing requirements to confirm their eligibility to participate in a major event.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe key requirement in Rule 15 is that an athlete from a \u2018Category A\u2019 country must undergo at least three no-notice out-of-competition tests (urine and blood) conducted no less than 3 weeks apart in the 10 months leading up to a major event.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOnly then do they become eligible to represent their national team at the World Athletics Championships or the Olympic Games,\u201d the statement noted.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Advocate.ng<\/strong> <\/em>gathered that Nigeria was included in Category A at the start of 2020, following a continued period of weak domestic testing levels.<\/p>\n<p>The 10 athletes are part of the 23 Nigeria had earlier entered for the Tokyo Games, and with their being ineligible the rest 13 can be involved in the Games.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, David Bowman, Chairman of the AIU Board, urged national federations to put more effort in support of anti-doping rules.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNational Federations must play their part in supporting anti-doping efforts.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe eligibility rules for athletes from \u2018Category A\u2019 countries are very clear and compliance is essential for cementing the required long-term changes, and ensuring a level playing field for clean athletes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI must underline that there have been significant improvements in anti-doping efforts in most \u2018Category A\u2019 countries, thanks to this rule.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe relevant National Federations in conjunction with their National Anti-Doping Organisations (NADO) have started to take their testing responsibilities seriously.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI thank them for their efforts, but there remains a long way to go in some circumstances.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Aside from Nigeria, athletes from Kenya, Bahrain, Belarus, Ethiopia, Morocco and Ukraine jointly make up the other 10 athletes who are said to be ineligible by the AIU.<\/p>\n<p>The AIU is an independent body created by World Athletics for the management of all integrity issues \u2014\u2014 both doping and non-doping \u2014- for the sport of athletics.<\/p>\n<p>NAN reports that the athletics competition of the 2020 Olympics is expected to begin on Friday in Tokyo.(NAN)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The chances of Nigeria winning medals in the ongoing Tokyo 2020 Olympics has further be dimmed as 10 Nigerians were amongst the 20 athletes declared ineligible to participate in the athletics events of the Summer Games. The Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) of World Athletics, the sport\u2019s world governing body, said in a statement on Monday &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[606],"tags":[9676,8925],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1815946"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1815946"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1815946\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1815946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1815946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advocate.ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1815946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}