For Afghan Weightlifter, a Second Attempt at Paralympics

Afghanistan’s only Paralympian is doing it again.

Mohammad Fahim Rahimi made it to the Beijing Olympics in 2008, but didn’t qualify in the preliminaries there.

Mohammed Faheem Rahimi lost his right leg in Afghanistan’s civil war 18 years ago, and says he regained mental and physical strength by powerlifting.

He’s had many challenges to overcome before he could be sent to the London Paralympics.

He walks on a basic plastic leg given to him by the Red Cross, and trains without a coach at the Kabul gym.

The BBC Persian service’s Tahir Qaderi interviewed the Afghan paralympian.

He tells anchor Marco Werman that even though Rahimi’s living and training conditions are not ideal, he fares rather well in comparison with the thousands of disabled people who live in Afghanistan.

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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman. This is The World. It’s day two at the Paralympic Games in London. And, yesterday, we told you about one of the athletes there, a swimmer from North Korea. Today, we focus on an Afghan weightlifter at the Games. His name is Mohammad Fahim Rahimi. He became a weightlifter to challenge himself and after losing his right leg during Afghanistan Civil War, and he’s had plenty of challenges. Rahimi walks on a basic prosthetic leg, given to him by the Red Cross. He has no coach and trains on his own in a Kabul gym. Dahir Kaderi, of the BBC’s Persian Service, interviewed him. He says Rahimi told him how he lost his leg 18 years ago.

Dahir Kaderi: I mean, he told me that he was walking in Kabul and then suddenly a bomb blasted, and then he says, “I wanted to stand up but I didn’t have any movement.” And then his uncle comes and takes him to the hospital. And then he was hospitalized for two months and then after that, because he was a disabled person, he was very isolated and depressed. And then he thought of just starting something to engage into the society, so he started powerlifting then.

Werman: So he has been powerlifting for a while. Has he been involved in any other international competition?

Kaderi: Yes, he made it to Beijing, as well, but he couldn’t make it because during the very first minutes there was a fail or something. That was the first time that Afghanistan had an athlete in the Paralympic Games.

Werman: Wow. So Rahimi has got very little funding, if any, at all. What does that mean for his training?

Kaderi: All that’s really true because the budget for the Paralympics Committee for three months is $6000, from which they have to pay $20 per month, as monthly wage, for 90 athletes that they have got. And Fahim Rahimi is a half-day minicab driver in Kabul, from where he earns $10 per day, and then half day he goes and trains in the Paralympics. So, really, his funding is from what he earns as a driver.

Werman: Right. And I gather the gym where he trains in Kabul, I mean it costs something, but he’s getting it for free.

Kaderi: Yeah, that’s true. But it’s quite hard for him as well, because he’s feeding also his family.

Werman: So in Kabul there are thousands of people who were injured and maimed by landmines over the years, and they’ve got no prosthetics and their care is minimal. Tell us more about the circumstances of all these disabled people.

Kaderi: The life for the disabled in Afghanistan, you can only come to understand the real situation once you go and see it with your eyes. Normally, they are called the burdens of the society because they are not engaging in the society and you often don’t see them, or you see them as beggars on the streets because there are no facilities for them like ramps or wheelchairs or lifts in the country. Then the official statistics say that there could be like 800,000 disabled in the country; however, the unconfirmed statistics suggest that there could be two million people left from the Civil War and then the recent war as well. There are a couple of other athletes who were competent. There was an 18 year old boy who had lost his leg only nine years ago when he was walking near Kabul airport. Then he was taken to the United States by an NGO and he went and had an operation. And when he came back, he came back as a swimmer and a sprinter. And he was quite competent and everyone was hopeful that he would make it, but because the head of the Paralympics is a former Jihadi commander, he was shot at by his enemies and then he was hospitalized and being operated abroad, so there wasn’t anyone to look after these guys to send them for qualifications. So therefore, they only brought Rahimi here.

Werman: Wow, that sounds chaotic.

Kaderi: Yeah. Yeah, it certainly does.

Werman: So now Fahim Rahimi is in London. Has he competed in any weightlifting events yet?

Kaderi: No, he will be competing on 4th September and he’s quite hopeful. He was telling me that he really wants to win a medal so that he can change the attitude and the stigma in the country towards the disabled.

Werman: And what does his competition look like? What are his chances of a medal?

Kaderi: It’s quite a big game for him and also a very big challenge, really, because he hasn’t been”¦ I mean he has been exercising over the last few years, but not really professionally. Like, for example, the Afghan taekwondo athlete who won a bronze medal, he was going to Korea for his exercises while Fahim Rahimi has been exercising only in Kabul, and on and off. So his chances are not so much. If we look back to Beijing he was not qualified, even within the preliminary stages of the game, because he couldn’t lift the weight. So the chances are less, but still he thinks that his presence is a great chance for the disabled to prove that the disabled also can do something and so that the government, he can draw the attention of the government towards the disabled by winning a medal.

Werman: Dahir Kaderi, with the BBC Persian Service in London, thank you very much.

Kaderi: Thank you.

Werman: Visit our website to find out more amazing stories about some of the athletes at the Paralympic Games. Our partners at WGBH launched a special online project called ‘Medal Quest’ featuring video, blogs, and more from London. We have a link at TheWorld.org.

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