Lord Coe: Lamine Diack corruption allegations shocked and angered me
World athletics chief Lord Coe insists he had no knowledge of allegations that his predecessor Lamine Diack took bribes to cover up positive drug tests until the claims became public last week.
His comments came on the eve of Monday's publication of a year-long probe by the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) that is expected wreak further significant damage on the crisis-hit sport.
Coe called these “dark days” for athletics, after Diack, 82, was placed under investigation by French prosecutors on suspicion of taking €1m (£713,000) in corrupt payments to ignore doping by Russian competitors.
But the Briton, who succeeded the long-serving Diack as IAAF president in August, stated he was unaware of the accusations against the Senegalese despite being vice-president under him for eight years.
“If these allegations are proven, then clearly bad people have manipulated the system and we’ll need a system of checks and balances to make sure bad people don’t get into those positions in future,” he said.
“In hindsight those systems should have been in place. My task now is to make sure they are and build a sport that is accountable, responsible and responsive. But it’s going to be a long road and we should not kid ourselves here.”
London 2012 Olympics chief Coe attracted criticism earlier this year when he described allegations that the IAAF failed to act on thousands of suspicious blood test results as “a declaration of war”.
Those claims were among those that prompted Wada to investigate, and one of the authors of its report has warned that its findings suggested the IAAF was more rotten than embattled football chiefs Fifa.
“This is a whole different scale of corruption than the Fifa scandal,” said sports lawyer Richard McLaren. “This report is going to be a real game-changer.”
Former middle-distance distance runner Coe, 59, said last week’s developments had left him “in clear shock and a great deal of anger” and had caused him to accelerate his own review of the IAAF.
He added: “These are dark days for our sport, but I’m more determined than ever to rebuild the trust in our sport. But this is a long road to redemption.”