The Welt-Anti-Doping agency Wada demands from journalists to sign gag contracts to restrict reporting. Harling criticism followed immediately, and that is not the only reason why the Wada is facing an uncomfortable week.
The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) will invite everyone involved in the anti-doping fight to the annual symposium next week. It threatens to become an unpleasant event for the organization, which should actually ensure that sports fraud is stopped, but this was mostly positive for doping agents, which was particularly positive about doping agents.
As if the crises triggered in such a way, the Wada started an attempt before its annual meeting to prevent journalists from being able to recover and prevent critical reporting from Lausanne in the coming week. Accredited journalists should sign a two and a half pages long gag contract as a requirement for admission.
If there is a violation, there is a risk
“Journalists should avoid it,” it said in partially spongy rules of conduct, “inappropriate comments about the event to give the speakers or other participants.” In the event of a violation, there is a threat of throwing out. Unlike in previous years, television shoots should only be in a narrow time window and in strictly limited areas.
International journalist organizations are officially complaining about the dancing. The condition catalog was “unacceptable”, wrote the President of the World Sports Journalist Association AIPS, Gianni Merlo from Italy, in a protest note available to the ARD doping editorial to Wada Generaldations Director Olivier Niggli. He feels “reminiscent of the dark times of censorship”. Merlo warned: “I urgently ask you to revise the accreditation requirements and respect our work, because the barrier that you want to impose against us is opposed to press freedom and can be misunderstood as an attempt to hide something.”
“Wada copies larger Sports organizations “
The ARD doping editor-in-chief said Merlo: “We have to protest and defend ourselves against this type of situation. This is completely unacceptable. The bad model of other international associations or larger sports organizations has created the possibility that the WADA behaves in this way. This is only the consequence of a world that tries to prevent our work. Try to curtail the access of journalists to many events. “
The German Sports Journalist Association VDS also wrote a letter of complaint to Wada. In it, his President André Keil wrote: “The attempt to influence reporting in advance is unacceptable. The conditions that they dictate to the media representatives contradict the basic principles of freedom of expression and press.
The Reuters news agency withdrew an article last year that was seen as support for the WADA. Reuters had previously had to admit that one of her journalists had made it possible to participate in the Masters golf tournament in Augusta as an accredited journalist to the man who was responsible for sending the latest “conditions”.
Secret Preference treatment
The processes again throw a bad light on the wada because they seamlessly fit into the picture that the agency left behind last year. Several crises have sustainably ramponed the reputation of anti-doping hunters. Last year, research by the ARD doping editorial team brought to light that 23 Chinese swimmers secretly received preference treatment after positive doping tests: in China, due to alleged contamination, not even temporarily blocked, as the rules require. Everything with the blessing of the wada.
A few weeks ago, the WADA once again shook the worldwide trust in rules for all athletes equally applicable: After two positive doping samples, Wada let the world ranking of Jannik Sinner get away with a mini lock. He doesn’t miss a single important tournament. He is also said to be the victim of contamination.
Protect fame and wealth?
There is indignation in the tennis scene, since other, less well-known professionals did not get away as lightly. “The majority of the players have the feeling that there is preference,” criticized Serbian superstar Novak Djokovic, “it seems that the result can be influenced when you are top player, has access to the best lawyers. The inconsistency frustrates all players.”
Experts from other sports such as the long-time boss of the German Athletics Association, Clemens Prokop, also complain of serious consequences of the Wada course. “The problem is that the Wada actually has a huge task, namely fighting for the credibility of sport, for the credibility of equal opportunities,” said Prokop of the ARD, “and if the Wada is partially deprived of the entire sport through spectacular decisions, which apparently is not in harmony with this goal, because even the credibility.”
Resistance is formed
Insiders of the anti-doping community assume that the difficult situation will be discussed in Lausanne in the coming week. Already last year, 18 national anti-doping agencies had merged to organize resistance with the participation of German Nada since the China case. “Basically, we have found that the way the Wada deals with this case, how it communicated it, triggered difficult to bad consequences for anti-doping work,” says Lars Mortsiefer, board member of the ARD’s national anti-doping agency, “There has been a loss of trust in the area of the Olympics that continues to be. Athletes can explain in our respective country. “
Mortsiefer describes the immediate consequences of the Wada crises on his work: “At any case, at every event we hear: ‘But the Chinese, they were treated differently.’ And accordingly, this is something that reverberates and accordingly encourages us to continue to ask for clear, transparent answers. “