KAMPALA: Former Olympic 400m hurdles champion John Akii-Bua has died in Kampala, it was announced yesterday. The 47-year-old Ugandan, who won the gold medal at the Munich Games in 1972, had reportedly been ill for some time.

Akii-Bua, one of 43 children, was one of the world's greatest-ever hurdlers. When he won the gold in Munich, he clocked 47.82sec, to take a phenomenal 0.3 seconds off the record set by David Hemery four years earlier at high altitude.

To honour Akii-Bua, former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin named a sports stadium in the runner's home town of Lira in central Uganda and a street in the upscale Kampala suburb of Nakasero, after him. Akii-Bua will be buried at Lira on Wednesday.

Maradona hires Ben Johnson as trainer

TORONTO: Diego Maradona, twice suspended for doping offenses and virtually retired from Boca Juniors, has hired banned Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson as a 1,000-dollars-a-day personal trainer.

``I want to be the best in the world again,'' Maradona said through a translator after a two-hour workout at York University on Saturday. ``Ben's the fastest man in the world a powerhouse, an animal.''

Johnson, 35, was stripped of his Olympic 100m gold medal in 1988 and suspended for two years for using anabolic steroids. The IAAF banned him for life after he failed another drug test in 1993. Maradona, 36, was suspended by Fifa for 15 months in 1991 after testing positive for cocaine use following an Italian League game. He also was thrown out of the 1994 World Cup and suspended for using banned stimulants.

Franco Baresi announces retirement

MILAN: Veteran Italy defender Franco Baresi announced his retirement from professional soccer today after 20 consecutive seasons with AC Milan. Baresi, 37, said he would stay at the club as a vice-president and would also work with the youth team.

Baresi made his debut with Milan on April 23, 1978, and played his last match for the five-times European champions at the end of the 1996-97 season. He played 716 official games at the heart of the club's defence, winning six Italian League titles and three European cups. He also played 81 times for his country.

Indian tour nets loss for the CBU

ST. MICHAEL: Weak corporate advertising and the high cost of production contributed to a loss of $ 500,000 for the Caribbean Broadcasting Union for its coverage of the Indian national cricket team's tour of the West Indies in April and May.

The CBU, a regional consortium of broadcasters which provides programming mainly to the English-speaking islands of the Caribbean, issued a statement saying it remains committed to airing the West Indies cricket matches, but ``the existing level of loss is unbearable. The CBU cannot do this alone.''

Gomez topples Borg for title

PRAGUE: Andres Gomez of Ecuador outlasted Bjorn Borg 2-6, 6-4, 7-6 (11-9) yesterday to win a $ 150,000 ATP Senior Tour event.

The senior tour includes grand slam or davis cup winners over 35 years old. The matches are played in a best-of-three format, but a `super tiebreak', where the winner must score at least 10 points, is played instead of the deciding set.

Adidas reject World Cup balls claim

PARIS: German sportswear manufacturer Adidas have denounced claims that the official balls for the 1998 World Cup finals in France are being made by prisoners in Chinese Gulag camps.

A Chinese dissident released from one of the camps this month said he had been forced to stitch balls bearing the inscription ``France 1998 Fifa World Cup'' for 15 hours a day at a monthly wage of 20 yuan (around one dollar).

Hassan banned for obscene gesture

CAIRO: Egypt's soccer federation imposed a ban from international competition on veteran defender Ibrahim Hassan yesterday for making an obscene gesture at fans in Morocco.

Hassan, 30, also was suspended from playing with his Cairo club side Al-Ahli. The duration of the suspension will be decided when a federation committee meets on Wednesday.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.