Exclusive: Caster Semenya’s Six-Year Legal Battle Will Inspire the Next Generation, says Hendricks Mokganyetsi

Three-time Olympian Hendricks Mokganyetsi believes that Caster Semenya's successful six-year-long legal battle with the Swiss Federal Supreme Court will go a long way in inspiring the next generation of South African female track and field athletes.

World Champs, Berlin 2009

The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights found that South African Olympian Caster Semenya was denied a fair trial by Switzerland’s legal system.

In a 15-to-two decision, the Grand Chamber ruled on Thursday that the Swiss Federal Supreme Court did not sufficiently review Semenya's appeal. This appeal was against the 2019 decision by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which had upheld World Athletics' differences in sex development (DSD) regulations.

In an exclusive interview with SportsBoom.com, Hendrick Mokganyetsi, a former South African 400m and 800m track athlete, went down memory lane to the 2008 African Junior Championships and the 2009 Berlin World Championships, where the discrimination against Semenya began.

Mokganyetsi was the team manager at the time, in charge of the South African athletes competing at the games, including Semenya, who took the world by storm, dominating the 800m category.

"I've been part of this case since it started in 2009 in Berlin when I was the team manager. I went through all sorts of things where she was humiliated by many people, including some of the athletes who did not understand," Mokganyetsi told SportsBoom.com.

"Basically, all this started in Mauritius (in 2008) when she ran the African World Record in the Juniors competition. Moreover, it was during the World Champs in Berlin (in 2009) where everything got out of control. Out of nowhere, something came up to say, Caster is like that."

"She fought that battle and said, I was born like this, and we who were beside her, we fought that battle to say that she's our girl, and she will remain a South African girl who will represent us."

"It's a very difficult situation that she went through, that she had to cut her career short because of discrimination and regulations that have been put in place by World Athletics."

"It's affected her opportunity to show her God-given talent to the world and show the world that a young girl from South Africa, from the dusty streets of Limpopo, can put the country on the map."

Focused & winning, through discrimination

While she was still allowed to compete on the world stage, Semenya endured unimaginable scrutiny from the media and shockingly from her fellow athletes, her competitors from around the world, including Elisa Cusma of Italy.

Through all the discrimination, Semenya prevailed, walking away with two Olympic Gold medals in the 2012 and 2016 Olympics before she was sidelined in 2019.

Mokganyetsi revealed that they had to use backdoors to take Semenya to training due to the sheer magnitude of the scrutiny she was subjected to in the World Champs in Berlin in 2009.

"When we were taking her to training, we had to use back doors because the media were sitting in the front entrance of the hotel. She had to go for training alone. It was not easy," said Mokganyetsi.

"We had to protect her and show her that as South Africans, we were behind her and that we would make sure that we remove all the barriers so that she could prepare herself for the Berlin World Champs, and she went there and did it."

Inspiring the next generation

With the recent ruling and the appetite that Semenya has shown in fighting for her rights, she has inspired the next generation of female South African 800m sprinters.

According to Mokganyetsi, one of the athletes inspired by Semenya's fight and life story is Prudence Sekgodiso, who, at 23 years of age, has already taken the world by storm, including winning a gold medal at the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Nanjing.

"If you look at what Prudence Sekgodiso did at the World Indoors, returning home in South Africa with a gold medal while hailing from the same area and place where Caster is coming from in Limpopo, it's a reflection of the impact that Caster has had in that region and around the country," said Mokganyetsi.

"She comes within the motivation of Caster, taking Caster as a role model and telling herself that what happened to my sister, I want to turn it around, and show the world that it was not Caster alone, and that she opened doors for us that we must come and show the world how talented we are as South African young girls."