Shock as Emily Chebet, six others banned for doping

Emily Chebet (centre) with Joyce Chepkirui (right) and Florence Kiplagat (left) during the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland on July 29, 2014. Chebet was on November 27, 2015 banned for four years for doping. PHOTO | BEN STANSALL |   AFPIn Summary

• Chebet has been banned for four years. 
• Also to receive four years suspension each are the 2015 Beijing World Championships sprinters Joyce Sakari and Francisca Koki. 

By AYUMBA AYODI
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Two-time World Cross Country champion Emily Chebet is among seven Kenyan athletes banned for doping offences.

Chebet, who won the 2010 and 2013 World Cross Country senior women’s race titles and failed in her bid for a hat-trick at the 2015 World Cross Country Championships in Guiyang, China, has been banned for four years of the use of Furosemide.

Chebet becomes the first Kenyan champion at a major world championship to be sanctioned for using prohibited substances.

Also to receive four years suspension each are the 2015 Beijing World Championships sprinters Joyce Sakari and Francisca Koki.

However, Koki and Sakari have protested saying Athletics Kenya has not given them a fair hearing even after they pleaded their innocence besides availing the pharmacist who administered the substance.

AK chief executive officer Isaac Mwangi dismissed their claims saying they were given three sessions starting in Beijing during the World Championships and in Nairobi to state their cases. Mwangi said they still have a right to appeal.

MwangI noted that while Furosemide is not illegal for use by patients it’s not allowed in athletics since it’s used as a masking agent. “It hides or cleans an illegal substance that an athlete might have used,” Mwangi said.

Sakari and Koki returned adverse findings that saw Sakari being barred from taking part in the 400m semi-finals, having set a national record of 50.71 seconds in the heats. Koki had failed to go past the first round in the 400m hurdles.
Sakari and Koki’s ejection from Beijing tainted Kenya’s historic performance where they topped the medal standings for the first time at the World Championships.

Sakari and Koki indicated that they recorded statements in Beijing followed by another session that didn’t discuss much due to lack of quorum. “Mwangi told us that we will receive four years ban each in our last session on November 9 besides being told to bring the pharmacist who was involved to the hearing,” said Sakari.

“We were told that investigations were to be done after we availed the pharmacists only to receive letters banning us on Friday evening,” said Koki. “The process was not explained to us.”

“All these were hearings and I don’t know which other sessions they wanted. We explained to them their rights and the need to have a lawyer but they didn’t see the need,” said Mwangi.

According letter seen by the nation signed by the pharmacist who is based at Kilimanjaro Dawa located in Nairobi, he acknowledged giving the two athletes Furosemide to help excrete excess water as a result of using creatine powder which is for energy and endurance. 

“The retention of water to an individual after using creatine is common with some patients as the pair,” said the pharmacist referring to Koki and Sakari.
The bans bring to 43 a total number of Kenyan athletes who have been sanctioned for doping in the last three years.

The seven athletes now joins the list of runners who have doped, coming two months after a promising 800m runner, Agatha Jeruto, was handed a four-year ban for the use of prohibited substance Norandrosterone.

JEPTOO BANNED

Rita Jeptoo, who had won Chicago and Boston Marathon back-to-back in 2012 and 2013, was banned for two years in January this year after she tested positive for prohibited substance Erythropoietin (EPO).

Chebet failed in her bid to win her third World Cross title finishing sixth where Kenya’s teenage sensation Agnes Jebet Tirop, 19, won, but her performance contributed Kenya’s team silver. 

That could see Kenya being stripped off the silver medal by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF).

Chebet won her maiden cross title in Bydgoszcz, Poland in 2010 but an injury saw her fail to defend the title 2011 in Punta Umbria, Spain where the reigning World 10,000m champion, Vivian Cheruiyot prevailed.