Just by getting into the boxing ring at the London Olympics, Sadaf Rahimi will be throwing a few punches in the fight for equal rights for Afghan women.
Rahimi, a determined 17-year-old student, wants to become the new face of Afghan women, gaining honour and dignity for herself and other women in her war-torn country and improving their image worldwide.
She will get her chance in London, where women’s boxing makes its Olympic debut.
“When we participate in the outside competitions, there is pressure on us,” Rahimi said while training in a makeshift gym in the Afghan capital. “But I will try to show that an Afghan girl can enter the ring and achieve a position for Afghanistan.”
She trains for hours three days a week, punching heavy bags and sparring with her teammates and trainers.
They throw punches on faded pink and green mats covering a concrete floor of a room in an Afghan sports stadium where the hardline Taliban regime used to stage public executions. The female boxers still don’t have a real boxing ring to hone their skills.
After the Taliban banned women from participating in sporting events, the International Olympic Committee suspended Afghanistan from the games. Afghanistan sent female athletes for the first time in its history to the 2004 Olympics in Athens.
Rahimi, who has the support of her family, is following in the footsteps of Robina Muqimyar, the female Afghan runner who competed in Athens. Another woman, Mehboda Ahdyar, was scheduled to go to the 2008 Beijing Games but couldn’t compete because of injuries.
“I am well aware that my opponents in the London 2012 Olympics are more powerful and even twice as good as me, but I have prepared myself to participate and win a medal,” said Rahimi, who started boxing four years ago and won a silver medal during a boxing competition in Tajikistan.
Rahimi, who fights in the 54-kilogram weight class, will get into the Olympics through a wild card berth. She plans to travel to London on February 19 to train for several weeks. In May she will fight in a competition in China, but win or lose there, she will be at the Olympics in London.
