Kevin Lancaster
Despite being found guilty more than two months ago of supplying an athlete with a banned substance, a Gauteng athletics official has still not been removed from his post.
Livingston Jabanga, a board member for Central Gauteng Athletics, was given a five-year suspension by the South African Institute for Drug-Free Sport in November. This followed a hearing into his supplying middle-distance runner Lebogang Phalula with Methylhexaneamine.
The allegations against Jabanga surfaced in 2011, according to the institute doping control manager, Fahmy Galant, when Phalula was first bust for taking the performance enhancer.
Galant said that when the athlete was charged with the offence she implicated Jabanga, saying he had supplied her with the drug.
Because of her testimony, Phalula was given a reduced sentence of three months by the institute after her hearing in August, 2011.
With the information they had obtained from her reports, the institute then charged Jabanga for his role in the doping. His first hearing took place in April, last year,and the decision to hand him a five-year ban from the sport was taken in November.
Yesterday it emerged that Jabanga was still serving on the board of the provincial athletics body, after a staff member at Gauteng Athletics and another board member both confirmed that he was part of the set-up.
Galant said that the relevant bodies, including Athletics South Africa (ASA), had been informed of the ban and the need to enforce it, but ASA had “not come back” to the institute about whether the suspension was in place.
ASA president James Evans said as far as he knew, Jabanga was “no longer a board member” for Gauteng Athletics and, if he was still serving, he “was in breach of the ban”.
General manager of Central Gauteng Athletics, Mandla Radebe, said:
“I cannot comment at this stage, as the issue still has to be discussed.”
Jabanga could not be reached for comment.
According to the institute’s 2012 doping report, 14 “athletics” competitors tested positive for various banned substances last year, with six caught for using Methylhexaneamine.
