Budd under fire

Press, 26 December 1984, Page 26

Budd under fire

NZPA-Reuter Pretoria Zola Budd’s decision to live in her native South Africa, but run for Britain, is embarrassing and will cause tension between sports organisations in the two countries, the South African national athletics chief has said. Professor Charles Niewoudt, the president of the South African Amateur Athletics Union, said he was concerned about a trust fund set up by the union’s vice-president which is paying for the 18-year-old runner to commute from South Africa to international events. “Zola cannot have her cake and eat it,” he said. “I think the whole situation has become an embarrassment to South Africa, not only to athletics but to sport

as a whole.” Asked if it was straining relations between the sport’s governing bodies in Britain and South Africa, Niewoudt replied: “It is definitely going to cause tension.” Budd successfully applied for British nationality this year to evade an international sporting boycott imposed on South Africa because of its apartheid policies. She ran for Britain at the Los Angeles Olympics in August but returned home afterwards and announced last month that she had decided to stay in South Africa while continuing to run for Britain in international events. Niewoudt said: “As far as Britain is concerned, we have had good relations

over many years and this affair is casting a shadow over our athletics.” The trust fund set up for Zola by the S.A.A.A.U. vicepresident, Jannie Momberg, was going to cause problems because it was administered by three South Africans, Niewoudt said. Under international rules such funds should be administered by nationals of the country for which the athlete competed, he said. “You cannot have a British athlete having a fund administered here.” Niewoudt said Budd had to make a decision. “If she wants to compete internationally, she must go back to Britain, live in Britain, become part and parcel of the community. Otherwise, she will have to let her British citizenship go.”