adminCollin Matiza : Sports Editor
SEASONED Zimbabwean sports administrator Robert Mutsauki has described his recent role as the manager of the first Refugee Olympic Team at this year’s Rio Games in Brazil as a different, unique and wonderful experience. The Refugee Olympic Team competed at the Olympics from August 5-21, for the first time in the history of the world’s biggest sporting showcase as independent Olympic participants.This came after the International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach in March declared that the IOC would choose five to 10 refugees to compete at the Games in the context of the “worldwide refugee crisis”.
The IOC then identified 43 potential candidates for inclusion in the team with the final selection taking into account sporting ability, personal circumstances and United Nations-verified refugee status.
From the 43 potential candidates, the IOC finally came up with 10 athletes — James Chiengjiek, Yiech Biel, Paulo Lokoro, Rose Lokonyen, Anjelina Lohalith (originally from South Sudan), Yonas Kinde (originally from Ethiopia), Popole Misenga, Yolande Mabika (originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo), Rami Anis and Yusra Mardini (from Syria) — who formed the first Refugee Olympic Team that competed.
The athletes competed in three disciplines — athletics, judo and swimming — under the Olympic Flag.
Initially, they were labelled “Team of Refugee Olympic Athletes”, but this was updated to Refugee Olympic Team.
And the IOC president, Bach, later directly appointed veteran Zimbabwean sports administrator Mutsauki as the team’s manager at their debut appearance at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro last month where he was in charge of the athletes’ welfare.
In fact, the team was supervised by a staff of administrators and technicians that was overseen by former Olympic marathon champion, Kenya’s Tegla Loroupe, who was appointed as chef de mission with Zimbabwe’s Mutsauki coming in as the manager.
Speaking to The Herald upon his return from Rio de Janeiro, Mutsauki said being in charge of the first Refugee Olympic Team at the Games was an enriching experience for him.
“Well it was a unique experience, but I believe an enriching one. It was not an easy assignment when you look at the background of the members of the team, the athletes who are refugees first and foremost and the experiences that they’ve gone through and the platform that they were being exposed to.
“And when you look at the team’s officials, all 12 of us who were meant to support the athletes, coming from many different backgrounds as well and yet one was expected to mould a team, to build a team spirit, that was not going to be easy because we know it’s difficult even with athletes and officials coming from the same country.
“But in this case it was a multi-cultural environment that we had to operate within and even to be accepted there in a leadership position in such a scenario it’s not that something which you can take for granted. In other words you also have to prove yourself,” Mutsauki said.
Mutsauki, however, said these were the challenges that they were anticipating, but still it was always going to be difficult in the end because there were not only challenges, but risks as well to be encountered in the process and they already had other constraints such as time because the team was only announced on June 3 (this year) and yet they had to go through the processes that were required such as accreditation, sports entries, arranging for transport, uniform and kit just like (for) any other team, “but when you compare it with other teams, they’ve had so much time to actually prepare themselves”.
“And also the preparation of our athletes, the actual preparation for competition was going to be another issue because they had only a few months to prepare for the Games and then that platform there could be intimidating for the athletes.
“And then the issue of the media. There was intense media interest in the team even before the Games, but particularly at the Games, just from arrival all the way through and for these athletes it was sometimes overwhelming for them because there were so many requests for interviews and so on day after day.
“In the end also it was difficult to balance the sport needs and the needs relating to the media because this was a first, a historic development because we’ve never had a Refugee Olympic Team participating at the Olympic Games and so the international media was really all out to get (interviews) at every occasion . . . We were flooded by requests and all that.
“And the media was focused on particular athletes (in our team) and the one that captured the most attention, although there was media attention for all our athletes, was Yusra Mardini, a swimmer from Syria who was our poster girl in the end because even when there was a media conference most of the questions would be directed at her.
“And also from the Brazilian media there was Popole Misenga, a judoka, who also was already known in Rio because he is a refugee based there and the media in Brazil already knew about him and all that. So that pressure was unrelenting to get the athletes to concentrate or prepare for their events.
“Most of them are what you call entry level athletes competing on the highest global competition platform, the Olympics and you can see the contrast there and the expectations, so you could feel for the athletes and we tried our best in helping them to cope and all that, but the athletes themselves surprisingly had no difficulty adapting to the environment.
“As soon as they got into the Games Village it was very easy to get along with them although I had not met with any of them before maybe because young people they don’t have hung ups and all that . . . they were just so excited to be part of the occasion.
“They were all young and they just wanted to meet other young people and they felt so welcomed . . . they were in a welcoming environment and they fitted in there well, but they still had to first deal with the media and then get ready for their competitions because when the competition was getting nearer you could feel that there was also some tension among them, but that was to be expected so we needed to guide them through this experience,” Mutsauki said.
During the Rio Games, IOC president, Bach, also paid a courtesy call to the Refugee Olympic Team at the Games Village together with the United Nations’ secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon.
However, no member of the Refugee Olympic Team managed to win any medal at the Games although a number of them improved in their performances and times, especially in athletics.
“We got a mixed bag of results, but the best performance was from judoka Misenga who went into the top 16. He was in the Under-90kg category. He first won against an opponent from India, but unfortunately in the next round, which was a group of 16 judokas, he was matched with a world champion from Korea.
“But in this match which lasted five minutes, he was able to survive for four minutes and he was then knocked out with one minute to go, but that was an achievement against a world champion for his level of performance.
“He showed that he has a lot of potential and character, so that was very impressive.
“We also had some good results in athletics in which Rose Lokonyen improved her time in the women’s 800m event by eight seconds in recording two minutes and 16.64 seconds in the heats.
“The swimmers did not perform quite well, but all our athletes managed to compete in all their events including Yonus Kinde who took part in the men’s marathon and came 90th out of 140 runners who finished this gruelling race.”
In fact, 155 runners started the men’s marathon on the last day of the Games, but 140, including Kinde (2:24:08), managed to last the distance with 15, who included Zimbabwe’s Wirimayi Juwawo, falling by the wayside.
But for Mutsauki, leading the Refugee Olympic Team for the first time in the history of the Olympics was just an unforgettable experience.
“It was a new and unique challenge which I had to conquer. For me it was an opportunity to make use of my experience and knowledge and I couldn’t let anybody down. It was a test for me in spite of the reputation that I had.
“It was a real opportunity to prove myself as a good and proven sports administrator and I’m glad everything went well,” Mutsauki said.
Online Reporter