AHEEN Athletics & Education refugee athletes and coaches are now registered with Athletics Kenya.
When Athletics Kenya announced the launch of their brand-new athlete registration system AHEEN Athletics & Education seized the opportunity for mainstreaming the members of the AHEEN Refugee Athlete Team into the national system. The innovative platform simplifies the process for athletes and Athletes Support Personnel of all levels to register and receive services offered by Athletics Kenya. AHEEN was readily supported by Athletics Kenya as the World Athletics natinal member federation, and the African Athletics Development Center, who delegated two registrars to Kakuma Refugee Camp to register AHEEN refugee athletes in early April 2025.
What are the benefits of the new system and why is this important for refugee athletes?
This new system offers a host of advantages for athletes:
- Reduced paperwork: Eliminate the need for manual forms and streamline the registration process.
- Improved efficiency: Save time and hassle with a user-friendly online platform.
- Centralized information: Access and manage your participation details conveniently through your dashboard.
- Enhanced communication: Stay informed with updates and announcements directly through the system.
- Refugee athletes are now fully recognised as members of Athletics Kenya, the national governing body of athletics in Kenya.
- Refugee athlete rosters can now be submitted for competitions at local, regional and national level, including the Kenya national trials for World Championships.
- Refugee athletes are completely integrated into competition programming and run under the AHEEN Refugee Athlete label.
- Coaches of refugee athletes are now fully registered with Athletics Kenya providing them with access to information and training offered by AK.
This is a crucial step towards formalising the inclusion of refugee athletes in national systems, recognising their right to participate fully in all local, regional and national competitions sanctioned by AK and for their competition, including national trials, results to be officially communicated to World Athletics.
Athletics Kenya is leading by example: it formalises the participation of refugee athletes by completely mainstreaming them into their regular management of competition registration and inclusion and performance tracking. We hope that the global governing body of athletics, World Athletics, borrows a page from AK and designs an equally mainstreamed system for refugee athletes through a review of Rule 4 of its Eligibility Rules to provide a transparent and fair selection procedure for refugee athletes to participate in international competitions.
