Anti-doping Agency of Kenya( ADAK) chairman, Daniel Makdwallo (right) and ADAK chief executive officer, Sarah Shibutse address a press conference in Nairobi on September 17, 2024.
Kenya is again flirting with a ban from athletics competitions globall almost two years after it escaped sanctions from World Athletics.
Kenya risks far-reaching ramifications from World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) for non-compliance after activities at the Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya (Adak) headquarters at Parklands Plaza in Nairobi ground to a halt due to inadequate funding by the government for the local anti-doping agency .
On Tuesday, Adak chairman, Daniel Makdwallo revealed that the Kenyan anti-doping agency has not conducted wholesome tests on athletes as required since the start of July owing to drastic cut in funding by Treasury.
Adak has been unable to run its operations normally after the government reduced its funding from Sh298 milion in the previous financial year to Sh20 million in the current financial year.
“Our operations that include payment of salaries, travel and tests have been hampered. We are unable to meet our mandate, and that means that all our activities are grounded,” Makdwallo told journalists in Nairobi on Tuesday.
Makdwallo warned of dire consequences from Wada. The local agency has already notified the global anti-doping agency of inadequate funding from the Kenyan government.
Makdwallo said that even though an allocation of Sh650m for athletics anti-doping special programmes has not been affected, Adak’s officers are not in a position to effect the programme with the reduced funding from the government. He warned that Wada coulddeclare Kenya non-compliant and ban the country from hosting or competing in any international events.
Sports Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen and Principal Secretary Peter Tum are yet to react to Adak’s statement.
If things remain the same, Wada could write to Kenya, notifying the country of its adverse status and give Kenya a certain period to comply with doping controls, failure to which the global anti-doping body could effect a ban.
Sports Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen and Principal Secretary Peter Tum are yet to react to Adak’s statement.
Kenya belongs to Category ‘A’ of countries where doping is most prevalent.
Some of the countries that Wada has declared non-compliant are Russia, Cameroon and Belarus. Athletes from the countries can’t compete under their national flag in international athletics events.
Cameroon, which was declared non-compliant in August this year, will not be awarded rights to host regional, continental or world championships in athletics, as well as other major sporting events.
Among the key events Kenyan teams are likely to miss out on competitions should Wada strike is the World Rugby Sevens Series starting in November in Dubai, and the 2025 Africa Nations Championships (Chan) in February.
The second edition of the Chepsaita Cross Country that is now a World Athletics label race won’t be sanctioned by the global body and Kenyan athletes won’t be able to participate in events outside the country.
On October 19, 2005, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation Convention, within the framework of the strategy and programme of its activities in the area of physical education and sport, came with an agenda to promote the prevention of and the fight against doping in sport, with a view to its elimination.
While sports had become a great unifying factor and a source of happiness across the world with nations converging for major sporting extravaganzas, it had also become a huge source of income and business industry.
However, its well-being was now threatened by people using shortcuts through the use of performance enhancing substances hence a great concern as calls grew on how clean athletes would be protected.
The recommendations from the 2005 Convention came into force in 2007, making it the fastest of the draft to be ratified at United Nations Conventions as countries or signatories moved to form their respective National Anti-Doping Organisations (NADOs).
The move came as a huge reprieve for the Wada that had been formed back in 1999 to fight doping in sports.
In 2009, Kenya became a signatory to the 2007, Unesco Convention and automatically became one of those countries that were to put in place structures under Nado that could reign in on the new vice of doping in sports.
The National Olympic Committee of Kenya (Noc-K) put up an office to handle doping programmes but the country was one of those hit most by the rise of doping cases with no proper structures in place to tame the rising cases for a long time.
The situation saw the country come close to being banned twice from the 2016 Rio Olympic Games and World Athletics events in 2022.
In 2017, Kenya’s doping cases rose to 57, a situation that worsened to see the World Athletics put Kenya in category A of countries where doping was prevalent in 2018.
Former President Uhuru Kenyatta signed into law the 2016 Anti-Doping Act, which saw the establishment of ADAK), a move that saved Kenya from being banned from the 2016 Rio Olympic.
Back in 2012, a German documentary by a journalist Hajo Seppelt alleged that unethical doctors were providing banned drugs to athletes, setting alarms at Athletics Kenya and WADA.
Then WADA President, John Fahey, visited Kenya and asked the sports officials to investigate the matter after another new documentary in 2015 exposed how it was easy to get banned substances on the counter.
Even though ADAK and World Athletics’ Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) came with stringent doping measures to curb the menace the cases still went up.
In 2015, the maximum ban for doping was increased from two years to four years with repeat offenders getting up to eight years. A missed test increased from one year to two years with repeat offenders getting four years.
After months of investigations in the country 2018, WADA Intelligence and Investigations department led by Gunter Younger disclosed that there was no systematic doping in Kenya like the case of Russia but the menace was serious.
Russia was banned from participating in World Athletics events in 2015 owing to state sponsored doping programs. Only a few Russian athletes have been cleared to compete under a neutral flag.
The government had spent close to Sh 2 billion on ADAK activities since 2016 by the end of the last financial year with the annual expenditures drawing over Sh 240 million.
Kenya was almost banned from World Athletics events in 2022 but escaped when President William Ruto committed Sh 650 million annually to the fight against doping in November of the same year.
The increased funding has seen heightened doping tests and the rise in doping cases, an indication that systems put in place are working.
A total of 38 athletes were banned by AIU in 2022 but the figures dropped to 29 in 2023 while ADAK banned 34 athletes in 2022 but the cases rose to 60 in 2023.
Adak has tested 8,145 athletes between 2021 and 2024 and 55,251 people have benefited from the organisation’s enhanced education and awareness campaigns.
