Mo Farah
is not Mo Farah.
His real name is
Hussein Abdi Kahin
.
The athletics star revealed that the story he had told so far about his origins is not true either.
The long-distance runner, who announced his withdrawal from the tracks a few days ago, was taken to the United Kingdom illegally as a child and treated as a domestic slave, as he himself revealed in a BBC documentary.
In the program, entitled "
The real Mo Farah
", which will be broadcast on Wednesday by the British station, the athlete, double Olympic champion of 5,000 and 10,000 meters, remembers that
he had always said that he was born in Somalia and that he had entered the United Kingdom as a refugee Joined from Mogadishu when he was 9 years old to join his father who works in London
.
But that was not the truth.
The six-time world champion was the victim of illegal trafficking when he was brought to London from Djibouti in the 1990s.
"For years I kept this hidden," the athlete said, adding that his parents never traveled to the UK and that
his mother and two brothers live on a farm in Somaliland
, which declared independence in 1991 but is not recognized internationally.
Her father, Abdi, was shot dead when Farah was 4 years old during civil violence in Somalia
.
He then went to live with relatives in Djibouti and from there was taken to the UK by a woman he had never seen.
She told him that he was taking him to Europe to live with relatives, a lie that seduced him because he had never traveled by plane.
However, when he arrived in London, this woman took him to her apartment in the Hounslow neighborhood, in the west of the British capital, and told him that he would start being called Mohamed.
Thereafter
he was forced to do housework and take care of another family's children and was not allowed to go to school until he was 12 years old
.
It was at school that he showed his talent for athletics.
At that moment his life changed, as he was able to participate in competitive events in British schools.
His sports teacher,
Alan Watkinson
, helped him obtain British citizenship under the name Mohamed Farah, which was granted to him by the authorities in July 2000.
The 39-year-old athlete said he wanted to tell his story to draw attention to slavery and human trafficking.
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