‘I did it for them’: Mo Farah pays emotional tribute to his wife and children as TV viewers sob watching how he was rescued from ‘child slavery’ by PE teacher to become an Olympic hero – as police confirm they ARE investigating his trafficking claims
Sir Mo Farah last night paid an emotional tribute to his wife and children as TV viewers sobbed watching how he was rescued from alleged child slavery by a heroic PE teacher.
The four-time Olympic champion, 39, revealed in a BBC documentary how he was brought to the UK from Somalia illegally, having assumed the name of another child, after his father was killed in the civil war.
Sir Mo detailed his arrival in the UK aged nine, adding that he was forced to cook and clean for the family that brought him to Britain, working as a domestic servant and looking after children younger than him.
Just hours before The Real Mo Farah aired, the Met Police confirmed to MailOnline that specialist officers have opened an investigation into his trafficking claims.
In a social media post yesterday, Sir Mo said his family was his ‘proudest achievement’ and that he created his revelatory film about his past ‘for them’.
Ahead of the broadcast, the 39-year-old shared a photo of his wife, Tania, and children – twin daughters Aisha and Amani, son Hussein and stepdaughter Rihanna – holding Union Jack flags on Instagram.
He wrote: ‘I’m so proud have represented Great Britain and to achieved what I have as a GB athlete. But, my proudest achievement will always be being a husband and father to my amazing family.
‘I did this documentary for them, so they could understand more about the experiences that led us to becoming the family we are today.
‘Not every child will have the easiest start in life, but that doesn’t mean they can’t go on to achieve their dreams. I hope you’ll all watch later and I can’t wait to hear what you think.’
The gold-medalist admits he has no desire to talk to the woman who brought him into the country – even after failing to find answers over why he was chosen to be smuggled in to do chores for her family.
Meanwhile, some of his relatives back home in Somalia have described the rollercoaster of emotions – from fearing the worst when he disappeared to the joy of seeing him conquer the world of athletics.
His cousin, Harun Aden, told the Times: ‘We thought he had been sold, that we had lost our boy. It seems to be that what happened to him was his luck.
‘We became his fans who followed his success in the world and at the Olympics with all our pride. He has made us all very famous. So it was a very bad story that became like a dream.’
In the film, the athlete – born Hussein Abdi Kahin – also reveals the lengths his heroic school PE teacher Alan Watkinson went to in order to help him escape a life of alleged slavery, obtain British citizenship and follow his sporting dreams – all while using the name Mohamed Farah.
Sir Mo and his teacher formed a close bond over many years, which even resulted in Mr Watkinson being the best man at his wedding in 2010.
Mr Watkinson said: ‘Getting Mo to the point where he had his British citizenship was quite a long process. It involved a couple of trips to the Home Office, lots of letters and form filling. There was a lot going on in the background.’
Sir Mo admitted he’d wrestled with the idea of going public about his secret past, and had been concerned about getting his teacher into any kind of trouble.
Mr Watkinson replied: ‘You told me, the school knew about it, everybody knew about it. But when you went through the process of social services you stayed as Mohamed Farah. To my mind at that point the state had recognised you as Mohamed Farah.
‘It’s only recently I’ve thought about it and questioned whether I did anything wrong in this situation, but I don’t think either I or the school did anything wrong – you were Mohamed Farah.’
Viewers heaped praise on Mr Watkinson and his efforts to keep Sir Mo in the country and inspire him to Olympic greatness.
One social media user wrote: ‘They talk about teachers and the impact they can have. The impact of Alan Watkinson on Mo Farah is unfathomable. Truly incredible.’
Another said: ‘This is what happens when you have the right teachers and help, you can conquer the world’, while a third added: ‘Mo Farah’s PE teacher is the MVP and needs to be protected at all costs.’
Sir Mo and Mr Watkinson first met in a javelin lesson at Feltham Community College in South West London when the future gold-medalist was 11.
Recalling the meeting, the teacher told Careers in Sport in 2017: ‘He arrived at the school a couple of weeks late because he’d broken his arm playing football in the summer holidays.
‘My first contact with him was in a javelin lesson, which obviously requires stern and strict safety regulations. I had 29 kids sat on the floor and Mo was swinging from a football goal post!’
The documentary reveals the heartbreaking work Sir Mo had to do for the family who brought him to the UK, until he bravely went to Mr Watkinson to tell him the truth in the hope of moving to a safer home.
Mr Watkinson said: ‘Mo told me he wasn’t the son of the person he was living with, that he’d been brought over to do all the jobs, look after the smaller children.
‘He also explained his name wasn’t Mohamed Farah. He was removed from his family, given a new identity and brought over here to do jobs and chores. That was obviously quite a shocking revelation to hear.’
Produced by the BBC and Red Bull Studios, The Real Mo Farah was a labour of love that took some 18 months to make, even though the concept was greenlit within a matter of hours.
The corporation’s factual commissioner Emma Loach had to sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) before the ‘bare bones’ of the story could be told, while several lawyers were consulted – both among the production team and Sir Mo himself – to make sure the tale was watertight amid potentially drastic repercussions.
Ms Loach said her first reaction to hearing the revelation was: ‘Crikey, I can’t tell anybody…and I’m normally not very good at keeping secrets.’
The BBC chief told Variety how they needed time in order to track down some of the most important players in Sir Mo’s heartbreaking story, including his mother and brothers, the woman he believes trafficked him and the ‘real’ Mohamed Farah whose identity he assumed for years – as well as allowing the athlete himself to process what he was discovering.
Producers were also fretting throughout the process process that some of the key characters might pull out, even after filming.
Bernadette McDaid, Red Bull Studios’ global head, said: ‘For the longest time, and [through] all the cuts, we were looking at the sequences, the scenes, individually.
‘Because at any given time, someone saying yes or no [to appearing in it] will completely change how we told the story. And that was why literally we were cutting up until a week ago, two weeks ago.’
It comes as the Met Police, which previously said it was ‘assessing’ the situation, tonight confirmed that specialist officers have opened an investigation into Sir Mo’s claims that he was trafficked.
A spokesperson told MailOnline last night: ‘We are aware of reports in the media concerning Sir Mo Farah.
‘No reports have been made to the MPS at this time. Specialist officers have opened an investigation and are currently assessing the available information.’
Meanwhile, the couple accused of bringing him illegally using another child’s identity could also face a Scotland Yard probe.
Nimco Farah has been named as the woman who allegedly took the nine-year-old future athletics champion to her flat in west London, posed as his mother and forced him to care for her children or face never seeing his family again.
She was not at home last night but a man describing himself as a relative said she was abroad and told the Daily Telegraph that it was not true that Sir Mo was trafficked and ‘when she comes back, we will decide’ if she will respond publicly. He added: ‘In Somaliland there’s nothing called trafficking or child abuse or stuff like that’.
Mukhtar Farah, who is believed to be separated from his wife and is now understood to live in Manchester, is currently in Somalia. He told The Telegraph: ‘I am not ready for an interview. Maybe next time. I am not feeling well.’
He was the man that Sir Mo had previously said was his IT consultant father, until yesterday the athlete revealed his father was actually a farmer from Somaliland called Abdi, who was killed by bazooka fire while working the fields in the country’s civil war when he was four.