L. MathekaEight land refugee Olympics sponsorship ahead of Paris 2024
Reading Time: 2min | Tue. 20.12.22. | 17:49
This follows a week-long visit to Kenya by Olympic Solidarity Deputy Director Pamela Vipond in early December where trials were held to select a team that would receive the sponsorship.
National Olympic Committee of Kenya (NOC-K) has, on Tuesday 20 December, unveiled eight athletes who will benefit from the Refugee Olympic Program to be run from January 2023 towards preparing and participating at the Paris 2024 Olympics.
Seven of the refugee athletes are drawn from athletic with one in Tae Kwon Do.
The Refugee Olympic athletes’ program was started in 2015, following the global refugee crisis to aid potential elite athletes affected by the crisis, announced by IOC President Thomas Bach at the UN General Assembly.
ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE ATHLETE REFUGEE PROGRAM
— TeamKenya (@OlympicsKe) December 20, 2022
with @Refugees
"Refugee Olympic Athletes represent Hope, resilience, and inclusivity in the Olympic movement." @TergatP speaking as the team is unveiled. pic.twitter.com/MaLXdPhsAc
First participation was at the Rio 2016 Games where 10 athletes featured with Tokyo 2020 having 52 in the program from 20 countries in 11 sports.
The main objective of the program is to send a message of hope and inclusion to millions of refugees around the world and inspire the world with the strength of their human spirit.
Since 2015, Tegla Loroupe Foundation has been managing and supporting refugee athletes through training the Refugee Olympic Athletes at the TLPF centre in Ngong, in the outskirts of Nairobi City. In 2012 athletes were in the program of Tokyo 2020.
They compete, they give hope and they inspire to change the world. ❤️ 🕊️
— The Olympic Games (@Olympics) December 13, 2022
What's your message to all the refugees around the world?#Refugees | #StrongerTogether pic.twitter.com/Muzhpm064h
However, the program is managed world wide by the National Olympic Committee of the respective country ‘Host NOC’, and therefore in the quadrennial leading to Paris 2024, the management of the program will be under NOC-K.
The program is funded through the Olympic Solidarity and thus NOC-K will collaborate with the concerned institutions for the continuity of the program.
NOC-K will be responsible for hosting all refugee athletes in the country, technical and financial rreporting and monitoring, reporting to Olympic Solidarity, integrating the refugee athletes in national programs/training camps/competitions and giving the athletes access to competition both locally and internationally.
Kun Waar-400m men
Rose Ihisa - 400m women
Dominic Lokolong- 1500m men
Anjelina Nadai - 1500m Women
Emmanuel Ntagunga- 5000m men
John Lokibe - 800m men
Josephine Tein- 800m Women
Gasto Nsazumukiza- Tae Kwon Do
