‘We’re going to be vocal about it, we’re going to make noise till we’re heard,’ South Africa’s gold medallist says.
Revealed On 31 Mar 2026
Double Olympic champion Caster Semenya says she intends to battle towards the introduction of gender testing for the feminine class on the Olympics, a coverage the South African insists “undermines girls’s rights”.
The Worldwide Olympic Committee (IOC) unveiled the coverage final week and it’s anticipated to change into a common rule for rivals in feminine elite sports activities after years of fragmented regulation that led to controversy.
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Semenya has been on the centre of a type of controversies on account of her long-running authorized case towards World Athletics over her proper to compete on the observe regardless of having a Distinction of Sexual Improvement (DSD).
“We’re going to be vocal about it, we’re going to make noise till we’re heard,” the 35-year-old athlete advised the Reuters information company on Monday.
“Now it’s a matter of ladies standing for themselves to say, ‘Sufficient is sufficient.’ We’re not going to be advised how one can do issues.
“If actually we’re accepted as girls to participate, why does my look or my voice, why do my inside components have to be an issue to participate within the sport?”
DSDs are a bunch of uncommon circumstances involving genes, hormones and reproductive organs. Some folks with DSDs are raised as feminine however have XY intercourse chromosomes and blood testosterone ranges within the male vary.
The IOC coverage doc mentioned together with “androgen-sensitive XY-DSD athletes” within the feminine class in occasions that depend on power, energy or endurance “runs essentially counter to making sure equity, security and integrity in elite competitors”.
Semenya, who gained two Olympic and three world titles within the 800 metres earlier than being restricted to shorter occasions, believes the IOC received the science mistaken.
Semenya mentioned “there’s no science” that XY-DSD gave an athlete a bonus. “I’ve been there, I’ve performed that. There’s no such factor as that,” she mentioned.
“There are folks who’re delusional. There are people who find themselves satisfied as a result of a girl is masculine, a girl is born with intersex circumstances, the DSD, they’ve talked about all these issues [that they have an advantage].
“However what I say is that should you’re going to be a terrific athlete, it’s by onerous work.”
The take a look at that will likely be utilized to all athletes who wish to compete within the feminine class will likely be performed by a cheek swab or saliva evaluation.
There will likely be additional investigation for any athletes who take a look at constructive for the SRY gene, which is on the Y chromosome and triggers the event of male traits in mammals.
“What this determination does, it undermines girls. It undermines girls’s dignity. It violates girls’s rights as a result of we all know traditionally, these [tests] have failed earlier than,” Semenya mentioned.
“Ladies have to be celebrated. Ladies are usually not speculated to be questioned about their gender. Why that’s their physique? Why it’s how they appear like? It doesn’t matter. Neither additionally the hormone stage. These are the issues which might be clearly genetics that can’t be managed.”
Semenya mentioned IOC President Kirsty Coventry, the primary lady and first African to carry the workplace, had did not correctly seek the advice of her or different athletes residing with DSDs in regards to the coverage.
“They despatched us a letter the day they have been going to publish [the new policy],” she mentioned.
“In the event you’re going to seek the advice of, seek the advice of with a real coronary heart. Don’t seek the advice of since you’re ticking the field. Sadly, they’ve ticked a mistaken field.”
