Athletics: Pieterse in call inquiry

THE former world 5,000 metres record holder, Zola Pieterse, has claimed that a mystery caller sabotaged her selection for the South African Commonwealth Games squad.

Mvuso Mbebe, the Athletics South Africa general secretary, said Pieterse was excluded from the 112-strong squad because the ASA had received a call last week saying she was unavailable for the Commonwealth Games, which open in Victoria, Canada, on August 18. Mbebe acknowledged that he did not speak to the caller nor did he know who it was.

Pieterse said: 'From the beginning I have always said I want to run the Commonwealths.'. She said that she had been hounded by anonymous telephone calls in recent months: 'I've had obscene telephone calls before. Maybe it's one of those.'

Bernard Rose, the ASA chief executive, said yesterday he would launch an inquiry into the incident.