Johannesburg - The government is committed to cleaning up Athletics South Africa as part of the 2011 World Championships preparations, reports the Sowetan.

"We are going to clean up the sport of athletics and this is long overdue," said Sport and Recreation minister Fikile Mbalula on Monday.

The World Championships are scheduled for South Korea from August 27 to September 4 where the likes of Khotso Mokoena, Mbulaeni Mulaudzi, Caster Semenya and Louis "LJ" Van Zyl are tipped to win medals.

Athletics has not been the same since the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee suspended and later banned ASA board members, including president Leonard Chuene, for their handling of the Semenya gender debacle in 2009.

Mbalula said: "Chuene obviously has many sympathisers and it's an open secret that he was championing transformation in athletics."

"As government, we are saying corporate governance is of paramount importance and that is why we are saying we need to get people of honour to run athletics."

Mbalula said athletics has always brought medals back to the country during the big global competitions.

"We also want to see development taken seriously, especially at school level, so that we will have other youngsters taking the baton from Khotso, Mulaudzi and many others."