Athletics coaches who entice their charges into inappropriate relationships are on notice.Athletics Kenya expelled two from their roll of coaches this week.

This action, though appropriate, has come rather too late.The gravity of the crime deserves a more deterrent punishment.

Using one’s position to solicit sexual favours is tantamount to rape or defilement. Banning them for life is a slap on their wrist.

Athletics chiefs need to consult with lawyers to draft laws that will safeguard underage female athletes from randy handlers.

Many athletes usually consider coaches as their father figures and those who turn on them to satisfy sexual desires engage in incestuous crime. The young athletes look up to the coaches as role models and avenues of achieving their dreams.

Coaches found guilty of having sexual relationships and impregnating underage athletes deserve jail sentence.

Those who have affairs with adult athletes, hiding under the ‘consenting adults’ provision, need to declare their interest and quit because of conflict of interest.

Unfortunately, Athletics Kenya has only turned the heat on locals, yet some foreign coaches are infamous for abusing underage girls. They often entice them with foreign trips and other luxuries only to spoil their careers and later dump them.

There are many talented female athletes who excel in their adolescent stages and wilt before hitting their prime in the sport.

What happens to these girls? Where do they go when their counterparts from other countries scale the height of stardom on the track and roads?

The bitter truth is these girls are turned into sex slaves by pests masquerading as coaches. Athletics Kenya has always promised to raid training camps where the girls are lured with promises of coaching and competition abroad. Currently, one of the talented athletes, who won a global title not too long ago, is breastfeeding a child she got from a relationship with a coach.

But this coach remains scot-free as his colleagues take the flak.

Athletics Kenya should not exercise double standards when dealing with amorous coaches.

However, we are encouraged by the recent move by the officials. They had to start somewhere and we hope life bans imposed on two errant coaches, one of them for allegedly facilitating defection of underage athletes to foreign nations, will serve as an example to many others.

Athletics Kenya must ask itself hard questions and take a firm position on this scandal. Many bad things are going on in some camps. Some officials charged with making rules for these camps either abet the crimes or simply turn their eyes the other way.

Kenya is renown as an athletics nation but only men and very few women dominate tracks and roads. A policy paper for nurturing talent among the youth is long overdue. As the athletics body considers action on such coaches, other sports organisations should also protect young athletes, who may fall prey to sex pests.