The revelation comes in a new documentary by the Uk broadcaster set to surroundings on Wednesday. Inside it, Farah also states his real title is Hussein Abdi Kahin and that this individual was born in Somaliland.
“Despite what I said previously, my parents never lived in the UK, ” Farah told the BBC.
He says the family has been “torn apart” after his father has been killed in the civil war when he was just 4 years old. Somaliland announced independence in 1991 when it broke away from war-torn Somalia, but has never been recognized as a sovereign state.
“I was separated through my mother and am was brought to the UK illegally under the name of another child called Mohamed Farah, ” he mentioned in a clip of the interview.
The four-time Olympic gold medalist was either eight or nine years of age when he was flown to the UK by a woman however never met before, he said.
Once he arrived, he says this individual was forced to “do housework and daycare. ”
Several years later, he was finally allowed to enroll in school, in which he confided in a PE teacher about his situation. The instructor contacted social solutions and Farah shifted in with a Somali foster family.
“I nevertheless missed my true family, but through that moment every thing got better, ” this individual tells the BBC.
Farah, who was granted Uk citizenship in 2k, says running kept him from a life in servitude.
CNN has reached out to Farah’s representatives for a comment.