Saturday, August 3, 2024 - The gender of Algeria’s Imane Khelif has been a topic of conversation following an incident at the Olympic Games.
A single blow from Algeria’s Imane Khelif made her Italian
opponent Angela Carini throw in the towel, explaining she’d "never been
hit so hard" in her life.
This led to outrage as supporters of Carini accused of
Khelif of being "biologically male".
Carini’s reaction, combined with Khelif’s disqualification
from last year’s women’s World Championships, has reignited the row
around who should be able to compete in women’s sports.
The organisers, the International Boxing Association (IBA),
said Imane Khelif and another boxer Lin Yu-ting did not meet the "required
eligibility criteria" for the female category, later claiming the pair
were found to have XY chromosomes.
The International Olympic Committee has accused the IBA of
disqualifying the pair based on an "arbitrary decision" with "no
due process," suggesting no scientific tests were carried out as part of
the decision.
However, childhood photos of Khelif, from Conservative
Algeria, shows she grew up as a girl.
Photos of her and her family show her as a young girl in female clothes, with her supporters saying she has always been a girl who just happens to have elevated testosterone and should not be made to suffer for it.
Khelif, who does not identify as either transgender or
intersex, is not believed to have commented directly on the qualification row
but alluded to it last month when she described 2023 as a difficult year.
Asked how she coped with missing the World Championships she
told broadcaster Canal Algérie: "It was a tough blow for me but I came
back stronger to show my strength and determination and show the
whole world the brave woman who is Imane Khelif."
The 25-year-old also told of the hardships she suffered
trying to break out of childhood poverty and make it as a boxer, describing her
story as "impressive".
Imane grew up in a rural village in Tiaret in western
Algeria, a country where opportunities for girls in sport are limited.
She was a keen and talented footballer until the age of 16,
when she discovered a knack for scrapping while dodging and defending herself
from boys who threatened her and picked fights with her.
But taking up the sport of boxing was a path paved with cultural and financial obstacles which Imane struggled to overcome.
"It was truly difficult, I come from a conservative region
and family. Boxing was a sport dedicated only to men," she told Canal
Algérie.
"The toughest thing for me was travelling between my
village and the town where I did my training. Those are obstacles I encountered
at the start."
Each week she had to take a bus from her village to the
training centre 10 kilometres away, but her family could not afford the fare.
"I ended up selling bread in the street, I picked up
crockery and other objects to earn money and be able to travel because I came
from a very poor family," she added.
She also began collecting scrap metal to sell while her
mother sold couscous and set aside the earnings for the travel costs.
"I had to do that kind of thing in order to keep doing this sport and now I feel like I’m living a dream."
Imane went on to tell Canal Algérie: "I never imagined
that one day I’d become a boxer and that I’d become world champion.
"I always liked football and I played it in my little
village, my father always preferred football to boxing.
"But I was very good at sport at my school and my
teacher encouraged me to switch to boxing, given I had good physical qualities,
and he was right.
"My trainer Mohamed Chaouel had called me to the boxing
studio and the moment I set foot in the ring, I instantly fell in love with
this beautiful discipline."
Imane is scheduled to continue her Olympian
campaign in Paris with a fight on Saturday, August 3.
It’s not clear who she’ll face but a win would guarantee her
a bronze medal.
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