Hickey supports life ban on cheats

ATHLETICSOLYMPIC COUNCIL of Ireland (OCI) president Pat Hickey believes convicted drug cheats should not be allowed return to Olympic competition, even though current sporting laws allow them to do so.

Hickey was speaking at yesterday's announcement of ACC Bank as one of the OCI's sponsors for the Beijing Olympics, now just five months away. Inevitably, the issue of Cathal Lombard was raised, the Cork athlete who returned from a two-year drugs ban to win last weekend's national cross country, and is now expected to chase qualification for the Olympic marathon.

"My own personal opinion is an athlete who is caught in any form of drugs should be banned from Olympics for life," said Hickey.

"That's my personal opinion, but I have no decision to implement that into the OCI until an executive committee meeting, and a general assembly would decide."

Lombard's case, therefore, will only be considered if or when it arises: "There is a sequence of events here. He has to qualify first, and his federation then has to nominate him to us. So only when it comes in front of us will we address it, and make a decision. But we will always make a decision in consultation with our partners the Irish Sports Council, and also the World Anti-Doping Agency, and the International Olympic Committee (IOC)," said Hickey.

The British Olympic Association (BOA) is so far the only national committee to adopt a by-law that bans any athlete with a drugs conviction from competing in the Olympics. By-law 25 has been on the BOA statute book since 1992, when the then chairman Arthur Gold decided Britain must take the moral high ground in the fight against doping.

"Their statutes are clear on that, but that's not in our statutes," added Hickey. "I think this whole issue that opened up with Dwain Chambers means that everyone has to have a real look at their rules and regulations. There's no point in us making rules that superior bodies don't recognise. So we go to them for guidance, because we totally support Wada in what they're doing.

"Certainly the will is there now in the Olympic movement to eradicate the drug menace from the Games. Jacques Rogge (IOC president) is very stringent on that. This is his one big thing since he became president. And Wada could have collapsed once or twice only for him coming in behind it."

Also present at yesterday's announcement was 50km walker Jamie Costin, one of Ireland's 13 Beijing qualifiers to date in athletics, who was also of the opinion that former drug cheats should not be allowed back into the Olympics. "There are two trains of thought here," said Costin. "First, that everyone deserves a second chance. But also if you're in a profession, and you abuse the rules of that profession, for example a doctor, then normally you get struck off. You can go elsewhere and earn a living at whatever else you want to do, but you can't be a doctor again. And I would be of that train of thought.

"The law right now is something different, and if that situation comes about, and somebody is on the Irish team that has failed a test before, then there's nothing I can do about that."