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Grace Chingoma Harare Bureau
ELEVEN years Elliot Mujaji sprinted to gold in Athens, the Zimbabwe Paralympic Committee are hoping that their current crop of athletes can emulate that feat and reap medals at next year’s Paralympics Games in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. Mujaji, won gold in the 100m race in Greece and it was the last time that Zimbabwe won a gold at the Paralympics.

The former Shabanie Mine athlete had also won gold in the same event at the 2000 Paralympic Games in Sydney, Australia. Since Mujaji’s exploits there have been two editions of the Summer Games in Beijing in 2008, China and London 2012 but there has been no podium finish for Zimbabweans.

Now a new generation of athletes has come on board and the ZNPC is hopeful the medal drought could end in Rio. Already, two athletics stars Laina Sithole and Shepherd Gumede have qualified for the Rio Games after attaining “A” standards at the African Games in Congo Brazzaville.

The Paralympic Committee is still looking at having more athletes qualifying for the Games. Yesterday, the Rio bound pair and other 13 other hopefuls concluded their one-week training camp in Harare.

As part of efforts to fine tune the athletes, ZNPC said they would be staging periodical camps monthly as they step up preparations for the Rio Games which will be held from September 4 to 18.

ZNPC president Michael Bulagango said they are seeking to end their long wait for a medal at the Games.

“Like any other team anywhere in the world, we are also as the Paralympic Committee trying to prepare our athletes for this big competition where they have to show themselves how they can fare against the best athletes in the world.

“But before we get to that podium, we have to make sure that we prepare this team adequately so that we are assured of gold medals. “As the Paralympic movement we have been starved for quite some time of the gold medals. The last time it was in 2004 and we can’t continue to be quiet, so we are trying to prepare our athletes with ongoing training camps.

“We’ve got confirmation from the International Paralympic Committee that Laina Sithole and Shepherd Gumede have already qualified. “The rest of the teams will have to go through another qualifier and make sure we have more athletes and also we are not focusing on Rio 2016 only but also Tokyo 2020 and beyond. So we have a combination of athletes some focusing on the other competitions to come,” said Bulagango.

The Committee is conducting their preparations with the funding from Agitos Foundation, a development arm of the International Paralympic Committee. However, the Committee is still appealing for more funding apart from government which has also been assisting them so that they have adequate preparations.

The 19-year-old Sithole, who is based in Zvishavane said she is looking forward to give it her best in Brazil. She qualified in the 100m and 200m T13. “I’m training very hard and I want to win a gold medal. I know it’s a higher level now where I’m going,” she said.

Gumede said he is also excited and is still looking forward to qualify in another race of 200m after he qualified for the Paralympics in the 400m T13 race with a personal best of 54seconds.

“I’m working on improving my times and I’m still looking forward to qualifying to qualify in the 200m. This is a great opportunity for me and I’m very excited,” he said.

Athletics coach Shadreck Chatunga said they hope the series of periodical training camps would help all the athletes including those who are still anticipating qualifying.

“We are glad we have at least two athletes in the A standard and we are working with the others, so that they get the same standard. We have brought them in camp so that they improve on their times and our focus is on gold medals.

“We have 13 other athletes in camp and they would be involved in a series of programmes locally and international competitions so that they qualify as well,” said Chatunga.

The coach added that at the start of next month they would have an intensive training programme for at least three weeks with the Rio bound duo apart from the training camps which they are having monthly for all the Paralympic hopefuls.

ZNPC secretary-general Lewis Garaba said besides training the camp they took advantage f the camp to also deal with other different aspects such as educating the athletes on anti-doping, grooming and the behaviour that is expected at such a higher level.

Lectures on the Paralympic movement, drug abuse, HIV and AIDS and how to be responsible were also held as the athletes were taught on career guidance.