The road to happiness: what African athletes do for a decent life

For the people of Africa, a career in sport is a tiny chance for a decent life, which not everyone gets.

A new project dedicated to soccer in Africa – “Negrisi” – has been launched on the YouTube channel of the famous video blogger Vasily Utkin. Each story is dedicated to one of the countries of the Black Continent, where there is practically nothing but soccer. A lot is told about the conditions in which future world stars such as Sadio Mane, Didier Drogba and many others trained. The world knows the stories of those who manage to become stars, but in addition to them there are a huge number of athletes in Africa, who do not do so well.

For a better life

African athletes are often victims of fraud, and it’s not just soccer. Many track and field athletes leave Africa as well. Often they are so eager to get out of the poverty that they are ready to go anywhere: Qatar, Bahrain, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan. Those who are luckier end up in Europe, but as a rule they are not fastidious and agree to work if they are offered normal training conditions and a decent salary. Instead of the promised good life, some of them end up in real slavery.

The example of Ethiopian track and field athlete Laies Abdullayeva, who agreed to play for the national team of Azerbaijan, where, as she said, she was not considered a human being. Her coach took a part of her money, forced her to train despite her injuries, and forced her to take dubious drugs. Having enjoyed all the delights of the “good” life, Liese returned to Ethiopia. Some time later, the Azerbaijan Athletics Federation said that the athlete had not signed any agreements with them, but confirmed that she had represented the country at international competitions.

Sometimes it’s the home country that puts a stick in the wheels. Kenyan track and field athlete Saif Shaheen was not needed by his national team, so he changed his sporting citizenship to represent Qatar. His new homeland provided him with a decent salary, good equipment for training, which allowed him to make a qualitative leap. At the next World Championships, he took first place and broke the world record. His brother, who placed fifth, was competing for the Kenyan team. He refused to congratulate Saif on his victory.

To go to the Olympics, the athlete needed to get permission from his native country, but the Kenyan Olympic Committee refused him. Despite the fact that even recently he was not needed by the team, the leadership of Kenyan sport was ready to break his career just to prevent him from performing better than those who made it to their team. And they succeeded.

Don’t do good

In the spring, another Russian video blogger, Yuri Dud, made a video about an ex-employee of Zenit St. Petersburg, Iosif Timchenko, who went to Zambia to coach local children for free. The journalist unvarnished showed the level of poverty in the country, where children do not every day have the opportunity even to eat. After the publication of the movie, the family of the protagonist of the issue started receiving threats of deportation because they spoiled the image of the country. A man who feeds children at his own expense, motivates them to get an education and accustoms them to a healthy lifestyle, while receiving absolutely no support from the state, was promised to be deported out of the country because he showed the real state of affairs.

Many of those who do not receive invitations from abroad do not lose hope for a better life and use not quite legal methods. For them, sport is still one of the few ways to escape to another world, so they do their best to compete in international competitions.

Every few years, during the Olympic Games or World Championships, host countries receive dozens of requests for political asylum from African athletes. Often these requests have no real basis, and those who fail try to stay illegally just to avoid returning to their home countries.

Most of those who have succeeded and made a name for themselves in Europe are well known throughout the world. Others have simply managed to organize their lives outside the countries where they were born. But there are still a huge number of those who have not been able to find a place in the sun, who are less fortunate and who continue to live in poverty with no hope that things will change someday.