Death threat to Farah’s pal
HE REPORTED COACH RAPE CLAIM
ONE of the world’s leading distance runners — a regular training partner of Mo Farah’s — claims to be living in fear of his life after raising allegations with authorities in his native Uganda that a coach has been sexually abusing female runners, some as young as 15.
Moses Kipsiro, who successfully defended his Commonwealth Games 10,000m title in Glasgow last year, told Sportsmail this week of the day five female runners came to him for help — and the death threats he says he has subsequently received after reporting the allegations to his national federation and the police.
On Monday Kipsiro passed details of the death threats — sent anonymously via text messages — to police officers in Kampala. But he claims he will have to leave Uganda with his wife and three children if police fail to investigate his claims. ‘I will have to protect my family,’ he said.
The story was brought to the attention of Sportsmail by Pace Sports Management, who also represent double Olympic champion Farah.
Speaking this week, Kipsiro, 28, said he was approached last year by five female athletes at a training camp for the African Cross-Country Championships.
Kipsiro says they went to him as the senior athlete and captain of the team and complained a coach had been raping them.
‘According to the girls he would tell them he wanted to get them pregnant and then have an abortion, because by doing that it would widen their private parts and enable them to run like Kenyans,’ Kipsiro told me.
‘I went to the federation and I went to the police. But so far nothing has happened. Apart from the fact that I have received these death threats. And I have been dropped from the team. I did not run in the World CrossCountry Championships in China last weekend because of this.’
Officials at the Ugandan Athletics Federation (UAF) deny the allegations but details have appeared in a Ugandan newspaper, which reportedly interviewed three of the female runners.
‘He would wake up in the middle of the night and come to our room,’ one athlete is reported to have told the Daily Monitor. ‘He threatened to chase us from camp if we ever said anything or turned him down. It was horrible. On some days, he would call one or two of us to his house. If you refused to do what he wanted, he would beat you up.’
In the same article team captain Kipsiro is quoted. ‘One day he gathered the junior women’s team in a secret place and told them that to run well, they must have sex or give birth.’
UAF general secretary Beatrice Ayikoru is quoted in the same story denying the allegations. ‘Those accusations against the coach are false,’ she said. ‘I met the athletes and no one mentioned such a thing.’ In an email to Sportsmail this week Ayikoru again rejected the claims, as did a spokeswoman for the UAF. ‘ The sexual allegations were levied last year,’ she said. ‘ The federation contacted police. It also established an independent commission formed of people who have ever handled cases of abuse (three out of four were women). The allegations were investigated by both police and the team established by the federation. There was no evidence of sexual misconduct.’