Early last week, the Minister for Information, Culture, Arts and Sports Nape Nnauye, presented the declaration before the House and it was later approved by the Members of Parliament (MPs), making the country the last East African nation to ratify the convention.
Speaking with the ‘Daily News’ from Zanzibar, TOC President, Gulam Rashid, commended the move, saying it will to a great extent help curb the use of performance enhancing drugs in the country. “It is a step towards the right direction because all banned substances in sports must not be allowed in the country,” he said.
Rashid also appealed to President John Magufuli to sign the bill so as to make it an official law, which will start to be applied against those who import and use banned substances in sports.
He added that if the president signs the bill, the country will attain a lot of benefits, among which he said is a 20,000 US dollars (about 40m/-), which will assist TOC in providing knowledge on the effects of doping and how athletes can prevent themselves from involving in doping habit.
According to Gulam, the fund are provided by the United Nations, Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) aiming at empowering the organisations in educating athletes on the effects of doping.
The TOC President has also advised athletes to take good care of themselves and avoid using banned performance-enhancing drugs, saying those who fail the test will have their dreams to succeed in sports completely shattered.
He also urged all sports associations and federations to ensure that they have in the constitutions a section that prohibit the use of banned drugs plus measures to be taken for those who will go against the rule.
Commenting on the ratification of the convention last week, the Boxing Federation of Tanzania (BFT), Secretary General Makore Mashaga commended the government for its move, saying it will help check the problem, which he said was not new in the sport.
“The issue of doping is not quite new in boxing and we have been experiencing such problems because some of our boxers take marijuana and that is part of doping,” he said, adding that though they have been trying to fight the problem still much more support was important at the policy level.
“We are pleased because the approval of the anti-doping policy will be a step forward in tackling the problem before it goes out of our control,” he said.
Mashaga added that BFT has been doing a lot in stopping doping among boxers by educating them on various occasions about the effects of doping and also by conducting frequent test in various competitions staged by the federation.
On his side the Tanzania Swimming Association (TSA) Secretary General, Ramadhan Namkoveka also applauded the government move, saying it has been timely made as the doping has emerged to be a serious problem globally and need to be addressed seriously before it goes deeper in destroying athletes.
“We at TSA have been aware of the problem and we have been conducting doping tests in most of our events as per FINA directives.
That is why I can say the problem is not big in our country compared to others. “However, we need to give more emphasis in providing education on doping problems to rescue our athletes from sinking into doping addictions.” Namkoveka explained.
He further added that the frequent testing has made the affiliate members and swimmers to be aware of the problem and take precautions and be ready for anti-doping test anywhere they compete.
“Failure for an athlete in an anti-doping test is a humiliation to him/herself and the country in general. As a nation doping is a challenge which needs to be taken seriously in order to ensure we avoid the humiliation,” he said.
On athletics where some of star runners globally had tested positive in recent years, the problem has already knocked the door as one of the country’s famous wind chaser. Sarah Ramadhan had a two year ban after testing positive in a doping test in Brazil.
Few years ago, the former AT Secretary General, Suleiman Nyambui admitted to the ‘Daily News’ that the use of performance enhancing drugs was common among athletes from footballers, boxers, swimmers, basketball players to runners.
He categorically cited the use of bhang (weed/marijuana), khat (mirungi/miraa) and alcohol as among performance enhancing drugs that are used by athletes to boost their athletic performance, especially because they can produce euphoria.
However, experts say Cannabinoids (such as marijuana and hashish) do not enhance performance, but they are banned because of their detrimental effects on the image of spor
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