Sierra Leone’s top sprinter, who vanished after the
Commonwealth Games in Glasgow last summer,
has been arrested after he was found in an
emaciated state, living rough on the streets of
London.
Jimmy Thoronka, 20, his country’s number one
100m sprinter, and tipped by some for a big
sporting career, disappeared at the end of the
Games last August. Along with several other
athletes he failed to return to Sierra Leone, and
until now his whereabouts had been unclear.
At approximately 7pm on Friday Jimmy Thoronka
was arrested for overstaying his visa. He is
currently being held at Walworth Police Station in
Elephant & Castle. A police spokesman said: “He
will be held here overnight and processed by
immigration tomorrow morning.”
Since the Guardian published the article hundreds
of people have been in touch to offer support,
and a petition has been set up on change.org to
support him. A new gofundme campaign for
Jimmy has also been started in the US.
Speaking to the Guardian before he was detained,
he described what has happened to him since he
vanished.
The homeless youngster also revealed his feelings
at discovering the devastation Ebola has wreaked
on his family back home, who had adopted him
after the death of his birth parents. “I was very
excited to be coming to the Games in Glasgow,”
he said.
“I saw it as my big chance. I had competed in
international competitions before, in Singapore and
the Isle of Man, but this was the big one for me.”
When he and his team mates left Sierra Leone for
Glasgow, some Ebola cases had been confirmed in
a few of the villages surrounding Freetown, but the
epidemic had not yet taken hold of the capital. The
death toll in the country is now more than 3,500
cases.
Thoronka said: “I was hoping to win a medal for
my country. But during the Games I got the
terrible news that my uncle had died, probably
from Ebola. I couldn’t stop crying. It was difficult
to continue with competing but I tried to carry on.”
Thoronka competed in one 4x100m relay at the
games, but failed to win any medals. He was
running times of 10.58 seconds for the 100m
sprint before the competition.
Today, Thoronka washes his set of spare clothes
in the public toilets and then spreads them out on
the grass in the park to dry. He is not working
illegally, nor claiming benefits or housing. He
understands the legal implications of remaining in
the UK after his visa has expired but said that his
situation is hopeless.
The president of the Sierra Leone
Athletics Association, Abdul Karim Sesay, said
Thoronka had the potential to be one of the fastest
sprinters in the world. He said: “He is not only a
brilliant sprinter, a natural athlete and extremely
fast, he is also very disciplined and focused and
willing to listen carefully to his trainers so that he
can improve his performance. He wants to be the
best sprinter in the world and I believe with the
right training and conditions he could make it.”
Since theguardian.com published his story, offers
to help Thoronka have flooded in, from across the
UK, Ireland and the United States. Richard Dent, a
Cambridge University student doing a PhD in how
social networking can help those in poverty or
crisis has set up a gofundme page which has
raised more than £1,600.
Thoronka described what happened after the
games. “I wanted to go to London for a while after
the Games but my bag with my money and
passport in it was stolen at Glasgow station. I was
scared to go to the police in case they arrested me
and put me in a cell so I begged someone at the
station to pay my fare to London and they agreed
to do that.” The athlete then managed to make
contact with an acquaintance who initially agreed
that he could stay with him and his wife in
Leicester.
There, while watching an African TV channel, he
heard the news that his mother, Jelikatu Kargbo, a
nurse in the police service, had also died of Ebola.
He later discovered that his entire immediate
family – including his three adopted sisters and
brother – had been killed by the virus.
After a while the acquaintance in Leicester asked
him to leave, saying that he and his wife needed
their privacy. Distraught and unsure what to do, he
said he drifted down to London and began
sleeping in parks and on night buses and begging
for £1 from passers-by to buy chips. “Some days I
get no food at all. I wash in public toilets and
sleep in the park,” he said.
“I wake up around 4am and if I’ve got a bus pass I
get on the night bus and sleep there until morning.
I met a man who sometimes lets me sleep at his
house but I have to wait outside for him to come
home at 10 or 11pm and I get very cold.
“We have a cold season in Sierra Leone but it is
not cold like England. Some days I don’t think I’m
going to make it and just feel like killing myself.
My dream is to become one of the best sprinters
in the world but I don’t see how that can happen
now. Maybe someone will see that I have potential
and give me some sponsorship so that I can train
here.”
If he returns to Sierra Leone he is not expected to
receive any training as he has become a “young
adult orphan” and because of the Ebola crisis there
is great uncertainty about whether or not he will
be able to continue his sprinting career. Meanwhile
in the UK he is barely surviving. “I’m very
frightened of what will happen to me. Life here is
very bad for me but if I return to Sierra Leone I
don’t think I will make it.”
In a small black rucksack he carries all his
possessions: a phone, an old toothbrush, a spare
pair of underpants and trousers, and a packet of
paracetamol, purchased in a pound shop, to stave
off the aches and pains that come from living on
the streets. “I can’t go back to Sierra Leone
because my whole family has been wiped out and I
can’t make it alone. Nobody is doing athletics
there now. Ebola has destroyed so much. But I
can’t survive here either if I continue living like
this. I don’t know what I am going to do,” he said.
Second tragedy
Sierra Leone has endured two tragedies in the past
two decades – first the civil war from 1991 until
2002, in which an estimated 50,000 people died
and then the Ebola crisis. Thoronka says he has
lost two families in his young life – the first family
during the war and his second family as a result of
Ebola. He became separated from his birth parents
when he was five.
They were killed in the war and he was placed in a
war child camp. He said he was then adopted by
Kargbo, a woman he said was kind and devoted to
him, and he enjoyed a happy and loving childhood
with this new family. “This lady brought me into
her home, she took me as her son and I took her
as my mother.”
He was brought up in the village of Gbendenbu,
west of Freetown, and began taking part in 50m
sprints at primary school and then inter-school
competitions. Kargbo encouraged him to study
hard so that he could become a doctor or a lawyer
but sprinting was always his first love and
eventually she agreed to let him follow his heart.
“At first my mother did not want me to be a
sprinter so I used to creep out of the house late
and night and practise my running at a running
track.”
He showed talent and commitment and had
become his country’s top sprinter by the time he
travelled to the Commonwealth Games. He won
medals in African competitions and received the
Sports Writers of Sierra Leone’s best male athlete
award in 2013. He was the first athlete in Sierra
Leone to carry the Queen’s baton in the run up to
the Games.
Thoronka is finding it hard to come to terms with
this loss of a second family. “I can’t believe that
my mother and all my family – my sisters and
brothers – have died from Ebola,” he said, crying
and shaking his head. “This is the second time I
have lost my people.”
Back in Sierra Leone, Sesay said he was happy to
hear that Thoronka was still alive, albeit in difficult
circumstances. “Jimmy is a brilliant sprinter and a
very nice guy. Everyone loves him,” he said.
“Things here in Freetown have been very difficult
since Ebola struck. Many of the athletes have lost
their families to the virus and I am looking after 10
of them at my house. It is a very difficult time.”
Thoronka: ‘a brilliant sprinter, a natural athlete and
extremely fast.’ Photograph: Supplied
“The picture here is very bleak,” he added. “They
issue an Ebola certificate here to confirm that that
is what people have died from. They have issued
the certificate for Jimmy’s family and I am going to
pick it up. The Ebola was very bad in Jimmy’s
village and the surrounding areas. People were just
dying in the streets, it was horrible.
“I am worried about the psychological impact on
Jimmy of losing his family and getting no support.
Things are very difficult here. Jimmy’s chances to
become one of the world’s greatest sprinters
would be much better if he could stay in the UK
and find someone to sponsor his training.
“It is hard for any athletics at all to take place here
at the moment, we are all just staying at home. The
epidemic is not over. It goes down and then it
comes back up again, even the vice-president was
in quarantine after his bodyguard developed Ebola.
We are praying it will be over soon.”
In conditions very different from those in his home
country, Thoronka tries to keep up some training,
when he has had enough to eat. He does
exercises at a free, open air gym in a London park.
“I’m trying to keep up my fitness and keep my
muscles strong but I’m weak because I can’t get
enough food so I only manage to do this once or
twice a fortnight. I used to weigh 75kg [11st 11lb]
but I weigh much less now. Back home I used to
do squats with 75kg weights. I can’t do anything
like that now.”
“But after everything I’ve been through I’m
determined not to give up hope. During the
training sessions in Glasgow I saw Usain Bolt, my
hero, and asked him to pose for a photo with me.
Unfortunately he said he was too busy training and
I never got another opportunity to ask him. He is
my hero and my ambition is to become the next
Usain Bolt,” he said.
“If I had not come to the Commonwealth Games I
probably would have died of Ebola along with the
rest of my family. I believe I was meant to survive
so I can succeed in my dream to be the best
sprinter in the world.”
During the competition two of Thoronka’s team
mates , cyclist Moses Sesay, 32 and table tennis
player Samuel Morris, 34, had been suspected of
having Ebola. Both tested negative for the virus. At
the time, Thoronka was quoted in the media as
saying that he wanted to extend his visa because
of Ebola: “We are safe here and it’s dangerous
there,” he said.
However, Sierra Leone’s chef de mission, Unisa
Deen Kargbo, told reporters that he planned to get
the athletes back home as scheduled on 5 August.
At the conclusion of the Games, Thoronka said,
there were problems with getting flights back to
Sierra Leone because of Ebola.
Many of those who have made donations left
supportive messages. Andrea Feast said: This is
one of the saddest stories I’ve ever read. He’s lost
two families and close to all hope in such a short
life.”
Several readers have offered Thoronka a spare
room in their home or a place to sleep on the sofa
bed in their living room. One offered board and
lodging and part of his allotment to work on so
that he would both be occupied and have lots of
nutritious food to eat.
One person has offered to set up a network of
rooms so that Thoronka has a bed to sleep in
every night.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “We cannot
comment on individual cases, but there is
assistance available for people to return home
when they are not entitled to remain in the UK.”
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