Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Mo Farah isn’t who he says he is

343 replies

SnottyLottie · 11/07/2022 23:42

news.sky.com/story/sir-mo-farah-reveals-the-truth-about-how-he-came-to-the-uk-12650126

My mind is actual blown after reading that. Poor man to have to go through such an ordeal. I wonder what ever happened to the real Mohammad Farah? ☹️

Hope this doesn’t effect his citizenship or anything.

OP posts:
Danikm151 · 11/07/2022 23:45

Bbc article states the chances of his citizenship being stripped are very low. He has been very brave to tell his story to highlight the reality of human trafficking.

Namechanger355 · 11/07/2022 23:46

Yes it’s just so surreal and awful really

how vulnerable he was when he was trafficked over

hope Nothing bad happens to him

wingliner · 11/07/2022 23:56

His story is shocking

He is SO brave for speaking out

He has been carrying this for a long long time

SnottyLottie · 11/07/2022 23:56

It’s honestly really disturbed me.

You hear stories about it all the time but I suppose it doesn’t really hit you until you can put a name or face to it to make it seem more human/personal.

OP posts:
Eatingchips · 11/07/2022 23:57

I teared up reading it. I always loved him. He is an incredible man. What a harrowing story.

Caulidop · 12/07/2022 00:11

His citizenship has been granted based on truthful accounts to the Home Office, he'll be absolutely fine. Unfortunately many others will have been through, going through, or about to go through this. Thank goodness for a teacher being there for this particular child. Always act on your suspicions/doubts, don't assume someone else wlil help.

midsomermurderess · 12/07/2022 00:18

He did find and talk to the real Mohammed Farah. The documentary plays in a day or two.

PutinSmellsPassItOn · 12/07/2022 00:24

He was lucky in a way..... the family who bought him are awful obviously. But clearly showed some care by sending him to school. Which saved him. What happens to those who don't get that? Human beings living barely below the surface yet we don't know exist.

Tsandjdarethrbest · 12/07/2022 00:25

The family who trafficked him showed him zero care. They made him look after their children and clean for them. The school said he was neglected when he attended. They are criminals.

mytrueaccount · 12/07/2022 00:50

Do you know why I'm crying over this? Not just that he was 4 when his father died, and 9 when he was brought here. But that he won his Olympic golds in 2012, and it's taken 10 years for him to dare to say that he was brought here under different terms than were told to the Home Office (aka Send Him to Rwanda Right Now).

mytrueaccount · 12/07/2022 00:55

And by the rules of this country, both now and when he was 9, Mo Farah was never a refugee -- only a "migrant." His father was killed, his country or region was enmeshed in a lethal war, but he himself had not been personally targeted. Under our rules he should never have been let in. Under our rules, he should consider himself very lucky he was let in to skivvy for someone else's children...

Tsandjdarethrbest · 12/07/2022 00:59

What kind of a person says someone should feel lucky they were trafficked as a child. You need a reset of your moral compass.

SettingsO · 12/07/2022 01:02

I don’t think she was saying he is lucky.

mytrueaccount · 12/07/2022 01:05

Under the current rules, neither Priti Patel's parents nor Boris Johnson's grandparents (by his Turkish great-grandfather) would be allowed in to the UK.
No, I'm not saying Mo Farah was lucky, Tsand.

Tsandjdarethrbest · 12/07/2022 01:06

I think you should maybe have worded your post more clearly.

xxcatcatcatxx · 12/07/2022 01:06

This is so sad 😞 Saw an article on DailyMail earlier about a uk father who’s son had been kidnapped and never saw him again. Don’t understand how people can be so ruthless. Can’t imagine being so young and just the sheer amount of mental processing you’d have to do. Guess it worked out for Mo but the mental burden must be huge, he must’ve felt such a sense of relief, especially everyone knowing a name that wasn’t even yours.

Stuff like this really makes you see the best and worst of humanity all at the same time xxx

mytrueaccount · 12/07/2022 01:14

Yes, sorry, Tsand. Hard in a quick post, without the face and tone of voice.

But it really gets my goat (I was a child refugee too, when we were still allowed, not originally to the UK) that our current laws are a bit like the old test of a witch -- throw her in the water: if she drowns, she was innocent, if she swims, she's a witch.

This is how it works. Someone like Mo Farah now: either you're alive, in which case there's no serious threat against you so we won't see you as a legitimate refugee; or you're dead, in which case you're a refugee, but too late, we won't even bury you in our graveyard.

And by the way: you can't apply for refugee status in Syria or Afghanistan. But if you leave those places and apply from Turkey, you're in a safe country so we don't have to take you. Basically, unless France descends into another revolution, we in the UK will never recognise anyone as a refugee ever again.

Tsandjdarethrbest · 12/07/2022 01:25

@mytrueaccount ah yes. It’s so easy for these things to be misread. I have worked in this field and it’s soul destroying.

mytrueaccount · 12/07/2022 01:29

Also (it's late and night and clearly I have truly been triggered -- sorry): in the example of the French Revolution: at the end, if we were much better organised than we actually ever have been, we might set up a refugee mental health group and invite Marie Antoinette, Jean-Paul Marat, Max Robespierre, Georges Danton, Napoleon Bonaparte, and even Toussaint L'Ouverture and Tom Paine to support one another... 😜

THisbackwithavengeance · 12/07/2022 02:47

Surely his "parents" in the UK should be prosecuted on modern slavery charges, facilitation of an illegal immigrant and kidnapping?

Poor Mo, he was very brave to tell that story.

mathanxiety · 12/07/2022 03:07

Well said, @mytrueaccount.

If he hadn't won his medals he would still be keeping his head down, and he would be living in fear.

Oblomov22 · 12/07/2022 05:00

Blimey. What a secret to hold. Is there a reason the tv programme is bring released now, not before.

Arewerelated · 12/07/2022 06:24

Bless his heart ❤️ what a shock for his wife too. I'm so glad his PE teacher and friends mum were such decent people

Hoppinggreen · 12/07/2022 06:32

Are we assuming what he says is all true?
He seems like a nice man and has done a lot for sport and I wouldn’t want him to lose his citizenship or anything but his last backstory was a lie but this one isn’t?

Hoppinggreen · 12/07/2022 06:33

Half of my post vanished
I said whatever the truth he sounds like he had a tough time as a child and I am glad he has a good life now

Swipe left for the next trending thread