Exklusive ARD Interview Caster Semenya: "It can lead to suicide"
In an exclusive ARD interview, two-time Olympic champion Caster Semenya describes the dramatic way her life has been affected by athletics' rules and how she experiences the discussions about gender identity in Paris.
It is hard to imagine how Caster Semenya must feel in the Stade de France. Sitting in the stands instead of competing on the track. In Paris in the middle of the hustle and bustle of the Games and yet excluded from the big show.
Caster Semenya, the double 800-metres Olympic champion from South Africa, would still like to run. But the 33-year-old has been barred from doing so since the sport’s global governing body, World Athletics, introduced rules five years ago that force intersex runners like Semenya to pharmaceutically lower their naturally elevated testosterone levels to avoid an unfair competitive advantage.
"I think it's one of those things that brings back the emotions - how unfairly, I was treated,” Semenya told ARD in Paris. “It's quite an emotional feeling, it makes me feel a little bit angry sometimes. Sometimes you say: 'I could have been there, you know, winning those medals'. But the most important thing is I'm here to support other women that are partaking in these championships."
Semenya wants to be Coe's successor
And that's not all: in the ARD interview, she outlines clearly and thoughtfully how she wants to play a decisive role in the world federation in the future. Caster Semenya wants to become President of World Athletics. "Yes, definitely," she says, "I'm working on my candidature for the Presidency." The mandate of incumbent Sebastian Coe expires in 2027, and he cannot stand again.
The occasion of the Olympics means that her whole case is being looked at from a different perspective. On Monday, the women ran the 800 metres, Semenya's distance, in the French capital. The new Olympic champion Keely Hodgkinson from Great Britain took 1min 56.72sec minutes this time. But she has already run the distance this year in 1:54.61.
Boxing feud reminds Semenya of her own past
Times like these are likely to cast doubt on the justification for Caster Semenya's ban. After all, Semenya's best time six years ago was measured at 1:54.25 minutes and her exclusion was justified on the grounds that she had an unfair competitive advantage. It was claimed other women could never run as fast as her without increased testosterone levels. "The girls are doing well, the competition is good," says Semenya today, adding: "So you ask yourself: what could have been the problem with Semenya running 1:54?"
I am here to fully support them.
Semenya also experienced moments in Paris that reminded her of her own rise and the bitter side effects. They came as the International Boxing Association (IBA) and the International Olympic Committee fought a feud in Paris on the backs of two female boxers. "I am here to fully support them," says Semenya.
The Algerian Imane Khelif and the Taiwanese Lin Yuting had to discuss their gender classification in front of the widest possible audience. It rekindled memories of what Semenya herself once experienced when she celebrated her breakthrough at the 2009 World Athletics Championships and, as an 18-year-old, had to publicly justify that she was not a man but a woman. She was first tested for her gender at home in Pretoria and then a second time shortly afterwards in Berlin during the World Championships.
Semenya has been fighting her way through the courts for years
The results were leaked by sports officials. It became known that Semenya had XY chromosomes and therefore a naturally elevated testosterone level, that she lacked ovaries and a uterus from birth, but that she had internal testicles.
It's wrong to treat young women like that. To violate someone’s body like that, particularly a young woman.
“I clearly remember the situation,” she recalls. “But you have to understand that, back then, I was just 18 years of age. I had no idea what was happening. I had no feelings towards it. But obviously when I go back and I look at how things have been dealt with. It's wrong to treat young women like that. To violate someone’s body like that, particularly a young woman. I'm coming from Africa. In my culture, you know, if you're treated like that is is a disgrace. For one particular individual to come and talk such words in that manner: to say, 'yes, she may be a woman, you know, but not woman enough'. It can destroy one. It can lead you into suicide.”
She has been fighting her way through the courts for years to assert her rights. In controversial rules, which were even tightened-up again a year ago, World Athletics demands that intersex athletes who have male XY chromosomes reduce their testosterone levels to below 2.5 nmol/litre for at least two years in order to create equal opportunities. Semenya refuses to reduce her testosterone levels with pharmaceutical drugs.
Hope for a "positive ending"
"It is very disappointing when leaders in sport move into an area where you are forced to change your body,” she says. “When you are forced to undergo treatments and operations. When you have to take medication to be allowed to belong. It's a disgrace.
This is wrong. This has to stop. We shouldn't treat people like animals.
Things like that piss me off, if I may say so, it makes me angry just to think about being forced to change my body. That I'm being forced to take medication that will harm my soul and my body, that will affect me for the rest of my life. This is wrong. This has to stop. We shouldn't treat people like animals. This is wrong!"
She lost her case before the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). However, she won a case before the European Court of Human Rights at first instance: the court ruled by a narrow majority that the rules violated her human rights and discriminated against her. The appeal proceedings are currently pending before the Grand Chamber and a hearing took place in Strasbourg in May. "Of course, I hope for a positive outcome," says Semenya, "I believe in the work we are doing. We have done a good job, we are changing lives."
Fighting for young women
Semenya is still running and training. After a break of almost five years, her last major international sports competition was the 2022 World Athletics Championships in Eugene, USA. When the rules of the world federation in force at the time regarding the eligibility of intersex women only provided for restrictions for certain competitions, she switched from the 800 metres to the 5,000 metres, but did not make it to the final, almost a minute behind the winner of her semi-final race. In South Africa earlier this month, she took part in a 10-kilometres road race and finished 10th in 37:13.
Semenya says today: “I'm a fighter. I was born a fighter. It's in my blood to fight for my people. It's in my blood to fight for young women. It's in my blood to make sure that things are dealt with in a collective way.”