Six teenage refugees living in Kenya and Uganda are competing at the Dakar Youth Olympic Games, the first Youth Olympics to include a Refugee Olympic Team and the first Olympic event held on African soil. One of them has already fought his way into a bronze-medal contest, which makes the team’s debut more than a symbolic one.
A medal bid that fell one win short
Judoka Arno Yafunga, 15, fled DR Congo with his family as a child and found safety in Kenya, including time at Kakuma refugee camp. On 1 November in Diamniadio he won his opening bout, lost his quarter-final, then won the repechage by ippon. He lost the bronze-medal contest by ippon to Mongolia’s Tugskhuslen Tungalag and finished fifth in the men’s -55kg, according to the International Judo Federation. His father, Arnold, is his coach.
Who is on the team
The other five have yet to compete. Clement Niyomuhoza and Nyataba Gatloth run the 800m, while Florence Masumbe and Rachid Rochene race the 200m, and Lourance Namukiza contests taekwondo’s -49kg category. Kenya hosts Niyomuhoza, Gatloth, Namukiza and Yafunga, and Uganda hosts Masumbe and Rochene.
The International Olympic Committee created the team and the Olympic Refuge Foundation manages it. Athletes must be elite competitors and recognised refugees in their host country, as determined by UNHCR. The Ugandan athletes came through a community programme called Game Connect, the first time the foundation has linked that grassroots work directly to an elite pathway.
Why the African setting matters
UNHCR estimates that more than 117 million people are displaced worldwide, 39% of them under 18. East and Southern Africa, where the six athletes are based, hosts 16 million displaced people, with Uganda and Kenya taking in the largest share of refugees and asylum seekers. The team’s chef de mission, Yiech Pur Biel, grew up in Kakuma, ran the 800m for the first Refugee Olympic Team at Rio 2016 and is now an IOC member.
Analysis: drawing the whole team from Kenya and Uganda frames displacement as a challenge Africa already carries, and it makes Dakar a milestone for African sport as well as for refugee athletes.
What comes next
Athletics runs from 8 to 10 November at the Iba Mar Diop Complex, and taekwondo from 8 to 12 November, according to Sport News Africa’s schedule. Watch the first results in the 200m and 800m, and whether the Game Connect route in Uganda produces athletes for future Refugee Olympic Teams.
