|
|
Uganda: Bayiga Reduced to Tears in Addis Ababa
 |
 |
|||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||
|
||||||||||
New Vision (Kampala)
3 May 2008
Posted to the web 5 May 2008
Kampala
WHAT was expected to give relief to a bad outing for Uganda's team to the Africa Athletics Championships, turned into a circus when Justine Bayiga arrived late for her 200m first round heat.
All, but poor team management, was to blame after officials preferred to use the vehicle to take athletes, who had bowed out of their competitions for training.
Consequently they left Bayiga who was to compete at 9am stranded at the hotel about 5km from the competition site.
To make matters worse, Bayiga like other athletes did not have any Ethiopian currency to hire a taxi to ferry her to the stadium.
By the time the vehicle came, the harm was done as she arrived at the warm up area moments before the starter's gun went off.
"There was no vehicle to bring me. The other buses were going to pass by the Nigerians' hotel, which means that I would have arrived late," said Bayiga, who could not hold back tears.
Bayiga continued sobbing after her dream of a first major championship medal was blown away not because she failed to outsmart her fellow competitors, but due to poor planning of her managers.
"I could not run without warming up," she said amidst tears.
Team manager Lawrence Kavuma was speechless when asked what went wrong.
But he acknowledged that that there was no genuine reason he could give for such actions in the circles of athletics management.
200m first round
|
1 G. Addy (GHA) 24.07
2 J. Zakary (KEN) 24.45
7 J. Bayiga (UGA) DNS
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Copyright © 2008 New Vision. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections -- or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Make allAfrica.com your home page | RSS Feed | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Top | Site Guide | Who We Are | Advertising | Search | Subscribe | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Questions or Comments? Contact us. Read our Privacy Statement. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
