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Dwain Chambers with Karen Doku, disability adviser at the Manor Gardens Centre and Welfare Trust, and Christa Moeckli, its acting chief executive |
‘I will talk to gangs on streets’ pledge by banned sprinter
Runner tells teenagers: ‘I’ve been dragged down to the gutter but managed to get out’
CONTROVERSIAL sprinter Dwain Chambers has offered to talk to gangs “in their own language” as part of a new campaign against knife crime in Islington.
Mr Chambers, banned from the Olympics after testing positive for a
performance-enhancing drug, launched a programme this week to find out what teenagers on the streets want.
The consultation exercise is being carried out on behalf of community organisation The Manor Gardens Centre and Welfare Trust, based in Archway.
It was at the 100-year-old centre that parents of murdered teenagers Martin Dinnegan, from Holloway, and Kiyan Prince, from Edgware, did voluntary work.
As part of the consultation, Mr Chambers will be working with the Damilola Taylor Trust, named after the 10-year-old boy murdered in south London in 2000.
He will talk to young people in Islington about how they can stay off the streets.
Mr Chambers, 30, who was born in Archway, said: “I’ve been dragged down to the gutter but I’ve managed to get out. I’m a perfect example of what can happen in life, good and bad.
“I know what it feels like to be left to fend for yourself. I’m bold enough to talk to the youth on the streets. I’m not afraid. They are just individuals.”
He described how different life was for young men when he was growing up in St John’s Way, Archway, in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“Growing up then was a lot more fun than I imagine it is today,” he said.
“We had the freedom to roam the streets to all hours. There were always a lot of activities. I never got into trouble as a youngster. In my day it was a case of fisticuffs and the next day we were friends again.”
He attended St Mark’s primary, and then went to St David’s and St Katherine’s School in Hornsey.
He now lives in Enfield, but his mother, Adlith, works as a nurse at Whittington Hospital in Archway.
Mr Chambers, who has a 15-year-old stepson, Jayon, said that sport had given him the chance to escape from the streets and make something of himself.
“My message will be: win or lose, sport is a great thing to do,” he said.
“It makes you get fit and that makes you feel good about yourself. Feeling good about yourself gives you confidence.”
Mr Chambers, the former world champion bronze medal sprinter, was banned from athletics for two years after failing a drug test.
Karen Doku, disability adviser at the Archway centre who helped launch the consultation, said she believed Mr Chambers would be an important and useful part of the team.
“He understands young people, and he is full of ideas and enthusiasm,” she said. “Who knows, he may even be able to convince some of our youth to stop hanging about in gangs and start training for the London Olympics in 2012.” |
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