8 November 2024
It’s a good feeling when good things happen to good people. Mphumi Mhlongo, a proud Kearsney College old boy, is good people and, after winning a Paralympic gold medal and a Paralympic bronze medal at the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris, he returned to the school to share his success with his alma mater.
Mhlongo, who holds the T44 100 metres world record, with a time of 11.00 seconds, sprinted his way to Paralympics’ gold in a season’s best time of 11.12 seconds.
Then, competing in the T64 200 metres, he ran a T44 world record of 22.62 seconds to better the previous mark, which he had set at the Tokyo Paralympics, of 22.81. Now aged 30, it was the sixth time he had bettered his own 200 metres world record.
Upon returning to Kearsney, Mhlongo, the South African Paralympic team’s flag-bearer, who matriculated in 2012, said passing through the school’s gates felt like a homecoming. And, although it had been 12 years since he left to take on the challenges of the wider world, the unified warm welcome from his former teachers was touching to observe.
Reflecting on the challenges that he faced while at Kearsney, and how they had helped him prepare for the top level of Paralympic competition, Mhlongo said the keywords that immediately came to mind were resilience and dedication.
He also spoke fondly about how he had felt embraced by the school when he first arrived on the beautiful Botha’s Hill campus. Mhlongo explained: “When you have those cultural challenges in a space that welcomes you and says I know you feel like you don’t belong, but this is your home, and you tell us what it is that you need, that belonging becomes something that is embedded in your DNA.
“When you get to those global stages, you step up and say, hey, I was at one of the world’s best schools – where potentially I shouldn’t have been, if you look at probability [of that happening] – so I can medal here and be a gold medallist. I can be one of the best in the world because that is exactly what my track record shows.
“The best school in the country, probably in the top 10 in the world, believed in me when I hadn’t put in the work or dedication, nor had the resilience. I was a child that had this wild dream that I just wanted to be fluent in English and if that is the only thing I had done then I would have succeeded.”
He didn’t simply succeed. He excelled. And it wasn’t only as a sportsman.
He became a Head of House. He captained the second football team. He also enhanced Kearsney’s reputation as a school with a rich academic history by achieving seven distinctions in the IEB matric final exams. On the cultural front, Mhlongo led Kearsney’s world-renowned choir to a gold medal at the 2012 World Choir Games.
Surely, he is the only person on the face of this earth to have won a World Choir Games gold medal and a Paralympic gold medal. Consider that for a moment. Out of the eight-billion people on earth, Mpumi Mhlongo is the only one to have recorded that superlative achievement.
He gives credit to Kearsney for giving him the belief, inspiration and confidence to achieve in spheres he hadn’t considered nor imagined before he arrived at the school. It opened a world of opportunities for him, and he has humbly shared his successes with the home of the Greyhound.
Explaining his strong connection to the school, even though his matric year was over a decade ago, he said: “We always say in South Africa it takes a village [to raise a child]. You know the common phrases of if you want to go fast you go alone, but if you want to go far, you go together, and Kearsney was that fundamental pillar…
“My way of having gratitude is to say, ‘hey, guys you were the reason why I am who I am today, so at every point when I am on the global stage and I might to be wearing the medals just know that you have at least a portion of credit to claim there, and I want to claim it together’.”
Already, Mhlongo has achieved more in his life than he had once imagined was possible. That has led to new possibilities and responsibilities.
“I’m part of many initiatives,” he explained, before naming some of them. “Steps, which provides clubfoot support in Southern Africa. That’s what I was born with but mine were just deformed such that they don’t have permanent disabilities.
“Jumping Kids South Africa, where we look at kids that have amputations, see how we can get them prostheses and go into mainstream schools, and use sport as a means to get into those mainstream schools. Thereafter, they get to choose whether they’re going to be a Paralympian or a professor in science, or whatever they want to do in life.”
Mhlongo said he’s determined to reach more people through organisations, like those, which are focused on changing lives.
“You just need to pick up your end and say you want to be part of the journey, and we will walk it with you,” he said.
You can follow Mpumi Mhlongo on Instagram.
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