SA long-jumper hit by death threats, claims before Olympic competition

Long-jumper Jovan van Vuuren crashed out of the Paris Olympics on Sunday morning and then disclosed he had received threats against himself and loved ones, plus messages containing wild allegations the afternoon before. 

Van Vuuren, who had arrived in France as a medal contender after jumping an 8.30m personal best in March, fought back tears a few times as he spoke about his nightmare that started around 5pm on Saturday.

“I got messages and death threats,” said Van Vuuren, adding the messages, made on WhatsApp, also targeted loved ones and mentioned a close friend who had committed suicide in 2018. 

Van Vuuren didn’t give details about what the messages contained, but said he had reported it to Team South Africa management straight away and had provided screenshots of the messages.

His attacker had “done his homework”, Van Vuuren added.

“I gave all the evidence to Sascoc [the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee] and to [athletics manager] Jean Verster. Hopefully the higher management and the SA [South African] embassy in France will take care of it,” he said.

Team South Africa confirmed in a statement “despicable threats [were] dished out to himself and members of his family that were sent via WhatsApp”.

“[Sascoc] is aware of the threats and has offered unconditional support to the athlete. He is also receiving professional counselling from Team SA’s psychologists.

“In addition the matter has been handed to the relevant authorities, including the police, for investigation,” the statement said.

Van Vuuren said he had been shaken by the messages. “I’m not used to stuff like that. It shook me a bit.

“A lot of personal attacks and death threats, especially with my past in terms of my friend committing suicide and doping allegations.

“I mean, I’m an athlete. There’s one thing, we work hard for. You work hard to be here.”

Van Vuuren said one of the team psychologists had counselled him. “I immediately went to her just to recover mentally from this, but last night crept up and it started getting difficult to process.

“I don’t know where the person got my number. He tried to phone me as well.”

Van Vuuren said he had the name of the person. “It did a lot of personal damage to me mentally. I’m going to take legal action.

“It’s not an excuse for my poor performance. It’s just mentally, especially with the stuff being said, especially with my best friend. I mean, it was a dream, we committed to this.”

Van Vuuren and his best friend from Bloemfontein had always dreamed of going to the Olympics, but in 2018 he committed suicide.

Their dream meant so much that the long-jumper had brought his friend’s running spikes to Paris to have a part of him at the Games.

“If I upset anybody out there, I’m sorry. But I didn’t have any intentions to hurt anyone.”

Yet Van Vuuren still managed to enjoy his experience at Stade de France, despite a best jump of 7.70m.

“I felt good during the warm-ups. The crowd is wild. I mean it’s 80,000 people. The crowd was electric. You could feel it running through your veins and stuff.

“I think this is the experience every athlete needs to experience once in their lives. I will cherish this forever. After I finished my jumps and took a look back, I just soaked it in.”

Cheswill Johnson, South Africa’s other jumper, also failed to advance to the finals, struggling to find his rhythm and achieving a best of 4.49.