Parfait Hakizimana: The Bullet That Shattered Childhood – Seeds of Resilience in Burundi’s Ashes
A Nightmare Etched in Memory
The scent of burnt earth. The metallic tang of blood. The weight of his mother’s still-warm hand slipping from his grip. At eight years old, Parfait Hakizimana’s world collapsed in a hail of gunfire during an attack on their displacement camp near Bujumbura, Burundi, in 1996. His mother lay lifeless beside him; a bullet had torn through his left arm, leaving it permanently paralyzed. “That day broke my heart,” he recalls, his voice steady but eyes distant. “But it also planted a seed – a will to survive”.
For nearly two years, Parfait Hakizimana languished in a hospital with rudimentary care, his arm healing slowly in a nation ravaged by civil war. His father, a soldier, shielded him from further violence until tragedy struck again: a motorcycle accident claimed his father’s life when Parfait Hakizimana was 19. Orphaned and adrift, he found fleeting solace in schoolbooks and makeshift soccer games, unaware that a martial art would soon rewrite his destiny.
Taekwondo: The Art of Rebuilding a Broken Spirit
At 16, Parfait stumbled upon a taekwondo class in Burundi. The rhythmic kicks, the discipline of forms, the bowing to opponents – it felt like a language his battered soul understood. “Taekwondo didn’t see my disability,” he says. “It saw my potential”. By 2010, he’d earned his black belt and opened a club, teaching children the same techniques that had anchored him. But peace proved fleeting.
When post-election violence erupted in 2015, Parfait joined thousands fleeing Burundi. In Rwanda’s Mahama Refugee Camp – a sea of tents housing 60,000 souls – he faced a new reality: scarce food, contaminated water, and the gnawing void of displacement. Yet, within a year, he carved out a dojang from dust, training 150 refugees, some as young as six. “Sport makes us forget our troubles,” he explains. “Here, we are not refugees – we are fighters”.
The Paralympic Dream: A Beacon for 82 Million Displaced Souls
From Mahama to Tokyo: Defying the Impossible
In 2017, Parfait Hakizimana’s resolve caught the attention of the Taekwondo Humanitarian Foundation. With their support, he began competing regionally, winning bronze at Rwanda’s 2019 Ambassador’s Cup. But his ultimate goal glimmered on the horizon: the Tokyo 2020 Paralympics, where taekwondo would debut. The logistics seemed insurmountable—training in a camp with no facilities, balancing fatherhood (his daughter Brinka was born in 2020), and surviving on UNHCR rations.
A breakthrough came in early 2021. The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) and Rwanda Taekwondo Federation relocated him to Kigali’s Amahoro Stadium. Under coach Zura Mushambokazi, he honed his signature move: a lightning-fast right-leg kick compensating for his weakened left arm. “He’s not just strong – he’s alive when he fights,” Mushambokazi observes.
On June 27, 2021, the IPC announced his selection for the Refugee Paralympic Team. When the news reached Mahama, cheers erupted across the camp. “They see me as proof that refugees can rise,” Parfait says. “Now I carry their hopes to Tokyo”.
Legacy Beyond the Mat: The Unbreakable Refugee Spirit
Parfait Hakizimana: “My Medal Is Their Hope”
Though Parfait lost his Tokyo 2020 match, his victory lay in merely standing on that global stage – the first athlete to transition directly from a refugee camp to the Paralympics. World Taekwondo President Chungwon Choue personally awarded him a black belt in Chiba, Japan, honoring his dual role as athlete and mentor.
Today, back in Mahama, Parfait trains over 1,000 children, using taekwondo to dissolve tribal divides and nurture resilience. “Sport teaches courage when life is hardest,” he says, cradling his now two-year-old daughter. His dream? To return to a peaceful Burundi and establish a dojang open to all—proof that “a refugee is just a person waiting for their chance to shine”.
Epilogue: The Ripple Effect of Courage
Parfait Hakizimana’s story transcends sport. It’s a testament to the unyielding human capacity to transform pain into purpose. As the UN Refugee Agency notes, over 120 million people remain forcibly displaced worldwide—12 million with disabilities. Parfait’s journey, documented by outlets like The New Times and UNHCR, challenges us to see refugees not as statistics but as torchbearers of hope.
Follow Parfait’s ongoing mission through the International Paralympic Committee and support refugee athletes via UNHCR’s Sports for Protection programme. As Parfait reminds us: “Good things lie ahead—if we dare to believe.”
Bridging Dreams: From Tatami to Pitch – A Shared Refugee Legacy
Parfait Hakizimana’s story echoes in the footsteps of athletes like Alphonso Davies, the Canadian soccer phenom who transformed his own refugee camp beginnings in Ghana into a fairytale career with Bayern Munich and the Canadian national team. Both warriors of displacement, they wielded sport as both sword and shield – Parfait’s taekwondo kicks and Davies’ electrifying sprints down the pitch carving paths from despair to destiny. Their parallel journeys, detailed in profiles by Inspiring Athletes and UNHCR, reveal a universal truth: refugee camps are not endpoints, but launchpads for souls unstoppable. As Davies told ESPN, “Where you start doesn’t define where you finish.” Together, they stand as beacons to the millions still waiting in limbo – proof that borders cannot contain dreams forged in fire. Explore Alphonso Davies’ inspiring journey here.
Photo by Ruslan Dovidov @Pexels
