South Sudanese Man Runs for Refugee Olympic Team

KAMPALA, UGANDA - When South Sudanese refugee Paulo Amotun Lokoro fled conflict from the country’s Western Equatoria state in 2006, little did he know he eventually would participate in international sports. He simply loved football, a game he usually played with fellow refugees at the massive Kakuma camp in northwestern Kenya.

But his entrée to the highest echelon of sports – the Olympic Games – came after he was encouraged to participate in a 2015 peace-building marathon at Kakuma. It was organized by the U.N. refugee agency and Kenya's Tegla Loroupe, an Olympian who was the first African woman to win a major marathon, starting with New York City in 1994. “I didn’t know I would go far. … I was just running,” Lokoro said of the Kakuma marathon. “We went to the field and jogged. I didn’t have the psychology of being in front or behind. My aim was to just follow the people going in front of me. I found some guys were tired and then I led them.” Now Lokoro is among an elite group of 29 athletes – including 10 originally from Africa – named to the International Olympic Committee’s Refugee Olympic Team. He will compete in the Summer Games in Tokyo from July 23 to Aug. 8.