800m champion Semenya gender row escalates

World athletics watchers are hoping that yesterday's victory by South African Mbulaeni Mulaudzi in the men's 800m final in Berlin will help defuse the gender row following fellow South African Caster Semenya's controversial win in the women's 800m event last week.

Mulaudzi led from start to finish and beat the defending champion Alfred Yego of Kenya in a photo-finish with a time of 1 min 45.29 secs.

Two factors make Mulaudzi's victory significant in the light of the Semenya controversy: first, he comes from the same Limpoko region of South Africa as Semenya; second, his time is considerably quicker than Semenya's.

"Perhaps all those people questioning her gender will now begin to understand that Caster's power and speed are to do with her cultural background as an African, and stop questioning whether she's a man," one senior athletics administrator told The First Post this morning. "And if Caster is a man and not a woman, then she's a very slow man. Mbulaeni beat her time by a clear ten seconds." (Semenya's time was 1 min 55.45 secs.)

The fall-out from Semenya's 800m victory and the news that the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) had insisted she undergo a gender test - the result of which is not yet known - continued to make headlines over the weekend. Indeed, it looked line escalating into a full international incident, even involving the United Nations.

Leonard Chuene, president of the South African athletics federation, announced on Saturday he was stepping down from the IAAF in protest at its gender test demand. Chuene asked: "How can a girl live with this stigma? By going public on the tests, the IAAF has let down this young child, and I will fight tooth and nail to protect her."

He also suggested that the speculation over Semenya's gender was racist. "Who are white people to question the makeup of an African girl?" he asked.

As a result, IAAF president Lamine Diack has launched an internal inquiry into the federation's handling of the controversy.

And according to a report in the Sunday Telegraph, the South African parliament is to lodge a complaint with the UN Commissioner for Human Rights, arguing that the gender test is "a gross and severe undermining of rights and privacy".

The fact that Semenya was to undergo the test was revealed before she won the 800m final in Berlin last Wednesday. The IAAF made the demand in the light of her breakthrough performance in Mauritius at the end of July when she won the African junior championship title in a time of 1 min 56.72 secs, taking nearly four seconds off her previous personal best.

The gender test did not preclude her running in Berlin - a race she duly won with ease, slicing another 1.27 secs off her personal best.

But the moment she won in Berlin, the bickering started - with several fellow athletes questioning whether she was really a woman. They pointed to her powerful physique, deep voice and facial hair. "For me she is not a woman," said Elisa Piccione of Italy, one of her beaten rivals.

It is not the first time Caster's gender has been questioned: she often had to show her birth certificate and even strip for snap examinations at school athletics meetings.

But Caster's father, Jacob Semenya, said: "I used to change her nappy and I know she's a woman."

If only it were that simple. According to medical experts, Semanya may suffer from the condition of pseudohermaphroditism, where male organs develop in varying degrees - which means that the absence of male organs is not proof of anything. ·