Current:Home > Stocks‘The world knows us.’ South Sudanese cheer their basketball team’s rise and Olympic qualification-VaTradeCoin
‘The world knows us.’ South Sudanese cheer their basketball team’s rise and Olympic qualification
View Date:2025-01-08 16:19:50
JUBA, South Sudan (AP) — Basketball has united the South Sudanese.
The country, which gained its independence just 12 years ago, is still celebrating the men’s national team after its first-ever qualification for the Olympics.
South Sudan will play at the Paris Olympics as the automatic qualifier from Africa thanks to a 101-78 win over Angola a week ago at the basketball World Cup in the Philippines.
Thousands of fans, some wrapped in the national flag, blew horns and flooded the streets of the capital this week to welcome the team home.
Chol David, a 22-year-old diehard fan, called it incredible and historic.
“The world knows us,” he said.
The players and staff met Friday with South Sudan President Salva Kiir, who expressed his pride for their accomplishment. The government called the Olympic qualification a “remarkable achievement.”
Earlier in the week outside the Juba International Airport for the team’s arrival, fan Anger Aquin Awan said “they have registered our names in history.”
South Sudan, ranked 62nd in the world, is the lowest-ranked men’s team to qualify for an Olympics since at least 2004, according to the sport’s governing body.
Upon arriving in Juba, team captain Kuany Kuany led a chant: “Where are we going?” he yelled. “Paris!” the fans replied.
South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011 after decades of conflict and sent its first athlete, a marathoner, to the 2012 London Olympics as an independent athlete competing under the Olympic flag. The International Olympic Committee made the country’s Olympic committee a full member in 2015.
Two years after independence, South Sudan fought a civil war that left nearly 400,000 people dead and more than 4 million displaced. The slow recovery from war continues with bursts of politically motivated ethnic violence.
But basketball dreams have brought South Sudanese together, fans said.
“We gathered here to welcome the basketball team as the country, not a tribe,” said 25-year-old Aman Akech, wrapped in the national flag.
With tears of joy, senior presidential adviser Kuol Manyang Juuk declared that the team’s success has reunited the country.
“The youth have re-liberated South Sudan again from tribalism and division,” Manyang said.
Kiir has pledged to build a basketball arena or indoor court in Juba as a gift for the team, the adviser said.
There has been little for the country to celebrate at this scale since independence, aside from the exuberant visit of Pope Francis earlier this year.
Millions of South Sudanese struggle with the deadly effects of climate change while receiving little support in one of the world’s poorest countries. The United Nations this month said it is cutting food rations to focus on the 3.2 million people who need it most because of reduced funding and insecurity, affecting communities “living on the brink of starvation.”
The civil war also ruined infrastructure. South Sudan doesn’t have a single indoor basketball stadium. The men’s team started its basketball journey in neighboring Kenya, playing on a concrete floor.
The team is filled with refugees and the children of refugees who fled decades of bloodshed and currently live abroad.
“We never thought that we would be here,” Kuany, the team captain, told The Associated Press.
The team’s Olympic qualification might not have come if Luol Deng, a former NBA All-Star, hadn’t stepped in and personally funded his native country’s program.
Deng, now the president of South Sudan Basketball Federation, said he and the players acted out of patriotism and have one goal: to put South Sudan on the map and change the way the world sees the country.
“We can erase the negativity and the things that have been said about South Sudan,” Deng said. “We’re using sport to do that, and I’m happy to be a part in doing that.”
Despite being relatively rich in oil reserves, South Sudan’s government still struggles to provide even basic services, let alone support sports.
“Sport without money can’t go anywhere,” said Albino Bol, the country’s youth and sports minister.
Kuany said South Sudan will continue to improve in areas beyond basketball.
“It is just a matter of time.”
___
AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/nba and AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports
veryGood! (7)
Related
- Judith Jamison, acclaimed Alvin Ailey American dancer and director, dead at 81
- See Zendaya and Tom Holland's Super Date Night in First Public Outing Since Breakup Rumors
- Biden is going to the site of last year’s train derailment in Ohio. Republicans say he took too long
- 'I can't move': Pack of dogs bites 11-year-old boy around 60 times during attack in SC: Reports
- Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson weighs in on report that he would 'pee in a bottle' on set
- EA Sports drops teaser for College Football 25 video game, will be released this summer
- Detroit Pistons' Isaiah Stewart arrested for allegedly punching Phoenix Suns' Drew Eubanks before game
- Biden is going to the site of last year’s train derailment in Ohio. Republicans say he took too long
- Why Amanda Seyfried Traded Living in Hollywood for Life on a Farm in Upstate New York
- Nordstrom Rack's Extra 40% Off Clearance Sale Has Us Sprinting Like Crazy To Fill Our Carts
Ranking
- Karol G addresses backlash to '+57' lyric: 'I still have a lot to learn'
- Man charged with setting fires at predominantly Black church in Rhode Island
- Ye addresses Shaq's reported diss, denies Taylor Swift got him kicked out of Super Bowl
- Kansas City mass shooting is the 50th so far this year, gun violence awareness group says
- Sister Wives’ Christine Brown Shares Glimpse Into Honeymoon One Year After Marrying David Woolley
- Post-5 pm sunsets popping up around US as daylight saving time nears: Here's what to know
- Pregnant woman found dead in Indiana in 1992 identified through forensic genealogy
- Cleveland-Cliffs to shutter West Virginia tin plant and lay off 900 after tariff ruling
Recommendation
-
Diddy's ex-bodyguard sues rape accuser for defamation over claims of 2001 assault
-
The Excerpt podcast: At least 21 shot after Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl parade
-
Montana Rep. Rosendale drops US Senate bid after 6 days, citing Trump endorsement of opponent
-
Reduce, reuse, redirect outrage: How plastic makers used recycling as a fig leaf
-
Homes of Chiefs’ quarterback Mahomes and tight end Kelce were broken into last month
-
Michigan school shooter’s father wants a jury from outside the community
-
Jury convicts Iowa police chief of lying to feds to acquire machine guns
-
Volkswagen-backed Scout Motors, in nod to past, toasts start of construction of electric SUV plant