Two South Sudanese Olympic athletes have been deregistered by their country’s athletics federation in retaliation for a decision made by the South Sudan Olympic Committee.
The move is in response to the revelation that Perth refugee and Australian sprinting champion Mangar Chuot has not been chosen for the country’s Olympic team.
The 26-year-old had been nominated by the South Sudan Athletics Federation for selection and is only 0.26 seconds outside automatically qualifying for the 200m Olympic final with a personal best of 20.76 seconds.
The Perth-based South Sudanese refugee also holds an Australian 2014 title in the 200metres.
Rio papers.
Chuot had been registered for the games and had been under the expectation that he was going.
Unbeknown to Chuot, on July 4 the South Sudan Olympic Committee chose 1500m runner Santino Kenyi, marathon runner Guor Marial and 19-year-old sprinter Margret Rumat Rumar Hassan in the women’s 200m.
Only Kenyi and Mangar Chuot were nominated by the South Sudan Athletics Federation for Olympic selection.
At the recent African Athletics Championships in South Africa, Hassan ran nearly a second slower than her countrywoman Viola Lado in the 200m.
The Athletic Federation’s secretary general has written to the country’s Olympic Committee deregistering Marial and Hassan.
“Neither of these two were select (sic) by the South Sudan Athletics Federation, therefore, the decision of South Sudan Athletics Federation is clear on this matter for prompt action taken to this regard,” wrote Jim Long John.
Mangar Chuot letter from the Federation.
“The Federation has deregistered their participation as South Sudanese athletes in Rio Olympics.”
Mangar Chuot’s Australian coach Lindsay Bunn said Chuot only found out on Thursday through a third party that he had not been chosen.
“No one had the courtesy to phone us, tell us, even speak to us about this decision prior to that and that in itself is a disgraceful thing,” he said.
“Mangar found out through a third-party email that this had occurred when he was sitting at home with his bags packed waiting for his airfare.”
Mr Bunn said the decision to ignore the federation’s two selections and chose its own athletes was illegal.
He plans to launch a joint legal challenge with the federation in the Court of Sporting Arbitration over the committee’s actions.
“We have to get the process going as soon as possible so Mangar’s got half a chance of getting over next week,” he said.
Chuot had also been competing in the games in his father’s honour.
His father Makur Chuot was killed during the struggle to gain independence for South Sudan from Sudan.
Mr Bunn said he was concerned about the emotional toll on Chuot.
“Mangar is quite devastated by what’s going on,” Mr Bun said.
“He’s upset that something that was meant to be an honourable decision by him to honour his father … and also to honour the country that’s struggling to form itself at the moment … this is how he’s treated.
“He gave up a lot to decide to represent them and now he gets treated like this.”
The secretary general of the South Sudan Olympic Committee Tong Chor Malek Deran told SBS that the committee was not sorry for excluding Chuot from the games and he did not “obtain require (sic) score”.
“We selected who is the best to represent South Sudan at the moment in Rio,” Dr Tong said.
