And the prize for Shameless Popularism goes to the ANC for pouncing on poor Caster Semenya when she arrived back in SA to claim her as their latest struggle victim.

Pic: Creative Commons, Flickr, Anyaka

All that was missing was anguished cry of “Amaaaaaandla” at OR Tambo Airport in Joburg yesterday when first ANC Youth League President Julius (or is that Julia?) Malema and then ANC Women’s League Winnie Madikizela-Mandela (plus President Jacob Zuma speaking later from Pretoria) trumpeted the 18-year-old athlete as a victim of oppressive forces  — those being the racist West, of course, and the media. Shades of Robert Mugabe, I hear you say, and if their opportunism wasn’t so pathetically transparent, I’d agree. Read The Times story here on her arrival.

Semenya won the 800m gold medal at the International Association of Athletics Federations’ World Athletics Champs in Berlin, last week amid controversy about her gender.

Now let’s remind all at Luthuli House what this is about: an 18-year-old girl who is truly a stupendous athlete. She’s already been through media hell in Berlin and now you guys are doing the same to her back home by making her a poster girl for the fight against racism. Shame on you.

I’d say it’s up to Semenya and her coach to decide whether to go through — or not — with the gender test and not a bunch of politicians with bugger all imagination. Lay off the girl, please. This does you no credit.

Meanwhile News24 has an interesting story up  about an Ozzie doctor and researcher who has looked into the hormonal aspect of the case and declared that there is very large range of so-called “normal” testosterone levels that could naturally occur in women.

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