The story of Murtaza Ahmadi went around the world in 2016. This Afghan boy, who was five years old at the time, went viral after his brother uploaded a photo of him on Facebook with a plastic shirt with the name and number of Leo Messi. All the media spoke of the little boy and his story even reached the ears of international organizations and, as expected, also of the Barça footballer and the Argentine national team. Messi wanted to meet him and finally there was a media gathering and many more snapshots. However, Murtaza was gradually staying in the I forget And now a report published by ‘Bleacher Report’ has revealed what happened next, bringing to light a shocking story.
The American portal has published a video in which Murtaza and his family narrate the hell that the history of the T-shirt made with a plastic bag has meant. “My brother told me he had to talk to me and he took me home, Messi wrote, gave me the plastic shirt and said ‘Murtaza Messi.’ He was happy, he was like a footballer”Begins to relate the protagonist of the story. “I took a photo and uploaded it to Facebook“, account Hamayoun, Murtaza’s older brother. What this Afghan family did not expect was that this snapshot would be the beginning of a true nightmare that includes threats, an attempted escape, fear of being kidnapped and, finally, the boy’s exile in Kabul, the capital of the country, separated from his family as a precaution.
Murtaza Ahmadi en ‘Little Messi: the Story of the Boy in the Plastic Bag Shirt’, reportaje de ‘Bleacher Report’.
When they published the image on Facebook it did not take long to run like wildfire. Murtaza moved everyone. However, in his town they laughed at him. “Everybody messed with me, they told me I wore plastic”, Remember now. “People began to think that in what economic circumstances we were, that I could not even buy a T-shirt for my son,” he laments Arif, the father of the little one.
Finally, rumors came that Messi was interested in meeting Murtaza and soon two boxes of people close to the footballer were sent to the Ahmadi’s house. “When I saw the boxes for the first time I thought that one would have toys for Murtaza and the other dollars”Explains his father. But he was wrong: inside there was “a ball and a shirt”.
Arif, father of Murtaza Ahmadi: “People started to hang around the house at night”
However, a rumor began to spread in the Ahmadi village that Messi had sent a large amount of money to the family. “Our culture is based on charity, if a foreigner is in contact with him, then he must have helped him”, clarifies his uncle. “People who passed through the town asked how he lived, if Messi had sent us a lot of money. And there started to be people hanging around the house at night. It was very annoyingArif remembers now. The situation of insecurity that they began to live in led the family to ask for asylum. In the petition, they included a taliban letter threatening to capture the family and make her pay for her actions with Messi. Despite this, the asylum request was never honored, much less accepted, so the Ahmadi had to return to the Jaghori district.
Later, the Ahmadi family received good news: Murtaza had been given the opportunity to travel to Doha and meet Messi, which could be the beginning of a better life. A multitude of snapshots emerged from that meeting that, again, went around the world. We see to Murtaza by the hand of the Argentine taking the field in a friendly match. We saw how the little boy clung to the athlete’s legs, hugged him with all his might and how finally the referee carried him in his arms so that he could start the game.
Messi with little Murtaza, in 2016.
Arif, father of Murtaza Ahmadi: “We went to Doha so that Messi could do something for him
but did nothing”
“I told him that I wanted to stay with him
, who wanted to play with him. He told me to go with my father, but I did not understand his language, ”Murtaza now recalls. “I was very happy because now that he was in Qatar, with his idol, with this great footballer, giving him the ball,” explains his father, who at that moment felt very hopeful. “We think that by going to Doha maybe Messi would be like Ronaldo”Adds Arif, who had heard the story of Zaid Abdul |, a Syrian refugee boy who jumped to the Bernabéu with Cristiano and whose family received asylum in Spain, in addition to rumors about large donations by the Portuguese. “We went to Doha so that Messi could do something for him
. But he did nothing for Murtaza”, Arif sentence.
The situation worsened and Murtaza had to leave for Kabul
As expected, the Ahmadi’s situation worsened when they returned: everyone believed that they were returning with a large amount of money donated by Messi and that they were hiding it. And the threats came, even from kidnapping. People used to stop Murtaza on the way to school and ask him if he was Little Messi. “He told them no, it was his brother”Explains the boy in the documentary ‘Bleacher Report’.
Murtaza Ahmadi en ‘Little Messi: the Story of the Boy in the Plastic Bag Shirt’, reportaje de ‘Bleacher Report’.
The situation became untenable and Murtaza stopped going to school, playing with his friends and even going out on the streets. Finally his family sent him with his uncle to Kabul, 300 kilometers from home. And even though he had his cousins to play at home, the fear of going outside persisted. The fear of kidnappings was also joined by an escalation of attacks in the Afghan capital: “There were many explosions everywhere. Boom ”. “I have no place to play. I do not have friends”Murtaza now regrets, who despite everything is clear about what he would do with the shirt if he could go back in time. “I would wear it, because I adore Messi”Says the little boy, who was able to return home a few months ago.