Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association (Socga) anti-oping session |26 January 2024
Promoting the spirit of sport and moral values
In competitive sports, doping is the use of banned athletic performance-enhancing drugs by athletic competitors, as a way of cheating, a trend that has also affected Seychelles’ tiny sports community, tarnishing the image of not only local federations internationally, but the country as a whole.
In 2023 alone, several local athletes tested positive for banned substances during international competitions ruining their status and in cases, possibly, their sporting careers.
To educate athletes on the consequences and impact of doping, the Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association (Socga), in collaboration with the Seychelles Athletes Commission will be hosting an anti-doping session tomorrow, in line with the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (Wada) International Standard for Education which instructs that national and international sport organisations evaluate their education programmes.
Tomorrow’s session which will take place at the Olympic House, Roche Caïman, will be facilitated by the manager of Wada Indian Ocean regional office Paul Nioze who will talk on the Anti-Doping Rule Violations (ADRV), Merna Albert who will highlight on values, and Dr Julie Shamlaye who will talk about steroids, drug abuse, and masking agent.
In 2021, Wada published the International Standard for Education (Wada, 2020), requiring that international and national organisations need to plan, implement, monitor and deliver anti-doping education programmes, with the ultimate aim to prevent doping.
One of the main objectives of anti-doping education is to deter an athlete from intentionally using a prohibited substance.
That is, education aims to discourage athletes from knowingly using a prohibited substance to facilitate their performance.
To help achieve this, athletes are informed that doping is against the rules and that anyone found to have doped can be banned from competing.
Compiled by Roland Duval