(ATR) Nigeria’s 16-year-old weightlifter Chika Amalaha has been provisionally suspended from the Commonwealth Games after failing a doping test.
She tested positive for diuretics and masking agents after winning the 53kg category on Friday. If her 'B' sample tests positive on Wednesday, she will be stripped of the gold.
"We [have] issued a formal notice of disclosure to an athlete following an adverse analytical finding as a consequence of an in-competition test," said Commonwealth Games Federation chief executive Mike Hooper in a statement Tuesday.
"That athlete is Nigerian weightlifter Chika Amalaha who was tested on July 25th. That athlete has now been suspended from the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow."
WADA president Craig Reedie, who is an IOC vice president, was shocked to learn that a teenager athlete had failed a doping test.
"I am very disappointed that somebody as young as that appears to have committed an offence at a multi-sport event like the Commonwealth Games," Reedie told Press Association Sport.
Hooper was questioned about weightlifting’s future as a Commonwealth Games sport following previous drug scandals. "I think weightlifting is a fantastic sport and a strong Commonwealth and Olympic sport," he was quoted by PA, adding that the suspension "shows we have a very robust anti-doping program in place".
"We want to send a message to anybody in any sport who would go down the route of taking any substance to enhance performance that they will be caught," he added.
Amalaha snatched 85kg before achieving 111kg in the clean and jerk to become the youngest Commonwealth weightlifter gold medalist. Dika Toua of Papua New Guinea won silver and India’s Santoshi Matsa secured bronze.
Coe Focuses on IAAF Elections
Sebastian Coe, the chairman of the British Olympic Association and former London 2012 supremo, was in the crowd at Hampden Park to watch the athletics today.
The double Olympic gold medalist in the 1500m was sat next to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge as he watched David Rudisha win his 800m heat. Coe singled Rudisha’s world record-breaking gold at the London Olympics as his highlight of the Games.
Coe said on Tuesday he had pulled out of the race to become the next chairman of the BBC Trust, the governing body of the broadcaster. Coe said he did not have the "capacity" for the job and said he was focusing his efforts on the IAAF elections next year. He hopes to succeed Lamine Diack as president.
Reported by Mark Bisson.
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