Wheelchair basketballers angered by IPC

"I am both devastated and mad about the decision," says Australia’s Annabelle Lindsey. "Not just for me but also for my team, the eight other athletes deemed ineligible and for the future of our sport."

The 22-year-old is one of the nine basketball players whose degree of disability was deemed by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) to be insufficient to be allowed to compete in the Paralympics.

"What I used to love most about wheelchair basketball was that it was the most inclusive sport in the world and it’s really sad that the IPC has taken that away from our sport," she tells DW. For Lindsay, this decision marks the end of her sporting career. The 22-year-old will now concentrate on her studies.

"I have now been put in a position where I am not physically able to participate in able-bodied sport but am not considered 'disabled' enough to participate in Paralympic sport."

Heartbreaker

Until 2016, Lindsay was considered a rising star in Australian basketball. She had received a scholarship at a US university and dreamt of a career in the WNBA, the US women’s basketball league. But then she dislocated her right knee. After the operation, the pain persisted, and the doctors’ diagnosis was osteoarthritis and cartilage loss, which meant the end of her "normal" career. Lindsay then swapped to wheelchair basketball and was called-up to the Australian national team, the 'Australian Gliders,' for the Paralympic Games in Tokyo.

"I think it’s very unfair to deem an athlete ineligible essentially three weeks before the Games were meant to start," said the Australian. "We have sacrificed our lives for the past four years to train specifically for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics."

Lindsay’s teammate Teisha Shadwell was also disqualified by the IPC. "I still feel confused and frustrated, like how can someone tell people they’re not disabled enough and how does confirmation from doctors and specialists with degrees and years of schooling saying I’m disabled not be good enough," the 17-year-old told DW: "I changed my whole life for this sport."

 

Apart from the two Australians, the IPC has also disqualified Germany’s Barbara Gross, the Netherlands’ Dagmar van Hinte, Genoveva Tapia, of Spain, David Eng (Canada), Cem Gezinci (Turkey) and George Bates (UK). The ninth sportsperson involved is not yet known.

Some of those affected by the disqualification are already looking back at their long Paralympic career. Eng, for example, took part in the last four Paralympic Games, won two golds and one silver Medal with Canada, and carried the Canadian flag at the opening ceremony in Rio 2016. The outrage about the disqualification of athletes with so-called “minimal disabilities”  is unanimous across all continents.

Escalation without warning

"There’s a lot of solidarity among the wheelchair basketball family and it helps," says Ulf Mehrens, the President of the International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF). "We were the messenger of the bad news, not the IPC. I found it very unfortunate."

At the end of January, the IPC threatened the IWBF with the removal of wheelchair basketball as a Paralympic sport should the association not enforce the IPC’s disability qualification, which had been adopted in 2015. "We were told within a very short notice and without any warning: 'You’re suspended for Tokyo and Paris, unless you stick to our conditions,'" Mehrens told DW. "Up until that point, the IPC had always said, after repeated inquiries, that the new classifications were 'about the wording, not the content.' There was no negative dialogue."

Wheelchair basketball has been considered a role model sport for inclusion, partly due to a points system which ensures that the use of the minimally-disabled does not distort competition. At national level, even non-disabled people are allowed to play in wheelchairs, but this does not apply to international competitions. "Our classification code has been in force since 1982 and has never been objected to," adds Mehrens. 

Paralympics are exclusive

Paralympic expert Thomas Abel argues the discussion should not be emotional. "The power struggle between the IPC and the IWBF has probably played a role," said the professor from the German Sports University in Cologne. "Maybe both sides shouldn’t have allowed the situation to escalate like this, using a bit more tact."

When it comes to inclusion, however, Abel doesn’t see huge damage being done.

"If we look at wheelchair basketball beyond the context of the Paralympics, nothing really changes.  You can still compete for a national championship as an able-bodied athlete," he said.

The Paralympics would have been "extremely important for inclusion," but according to Abel, they’re inherently exclusive. "Those taking part must have a certain degree of disability. People without disabilities cannot compete. It’s how it’s intended and for good reason." However, the fact some athletes were disqualified from competing such a short period of time ahead of the Paralympics is "very unfortunate," Able says.

"Maybe there was a wiser solution to be found, in the form of the IWBF admitting the athletes do not fit the IPC’s criteria, but at the same time, the IPC could have disqualified them only after the Paralympics in Tokyo. In any case, I’d like to see a solution that values the career achievement of the athletes involved."

Equal rights for all?

This was also the suggestion made by the IWBF. "They [the IPC] rejected it categorically," said IWBF President Mehrens. "I think it’s a shame."

The IPC told DW that such disqualifications could take place in any sports, "even if the athletes in question took part in previous competitions."

In the summer of 2019, however, the IPC agreed with the international tennis association (ITF) on a transitional rule for wheelchair tennis players who slipped through the net of the organization’s new code. If the athletes in question were eligible in accordance with the "previous rules," they would have been allowed to take part, the ITF announced in August 2019. That ruling includes the Tokyo Paralympics. "The reason for having two different interpretations of the same rule is a mystery to me," Mehrens said.

The fight against the IPC’s decision continues

Mehrens sees it as his "absolute duty" to keep fighting to ensure that the nine players affected are allowed to compete at the Tokyo Games, which have been postponed to 2021. According to the IWPF president, his association will meet the criteria for the next two Paralympic Games. At the same time, however, he says he will continue to "build up an international environment for the defense of inclusivity." The IWBF will seek dialogue with the IPC in a bid to enhance the classification codes, "without making threats to take toys away like little children," according to Mehrens.

George Bates, one of the nine athletes disqualified by the IPC, does not accept the decision. "I can’t get my head around this decision, I’ve been disabled for 15 years and for 10 of them I have dedicated my life to this sport," he told DW. "This affects so many other athletes from all sports and with a lot of other disabilities. What do we say to the 14-year-old with a disability who now can’t compete? That’s it, you can not play able bodied or disability sport?"

Bates would like to keep on fighting for the right to compete. "What is happening is not right."