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Missing Ugandan Rugby Stars Turn Up In Wales
The pair are found playing for a local team in Cardiff after failing to return home following the Commonwealth Games in August.
18:46, UK, Sunday 08 February 2015
Uganda's Philip Pariyo (L) and Benon Kizza
Two Ugandan rugby players who went missing after Glasgow's Commonwealth Games have been found playing for an amateur club in Wales.
Rugby sevens players Benon Kizza, 27, and Philip Pariyo, 26, initially vanished in August.
The players disappeared after Glasgow's Commonwealth Games in 2014
The Ugandan government launched an investigation after the two were reportedly seen working at a Glasgow car wash.
But after claiming asylum the pair turned up in a Cardiff hostel for asylum seekers and kept up their rugby by joining a local team.
St Peter's RFC competes in the local Welsh league and has a mixture of office workers, students and builders playing for them.
Club chairman Joe Sweeney said: "We have actually signed them now and they are playing for us. We have gone through all the bureaucratic procedures and everything and they are signed as St Peter's players."
Mr Sweeney said the pair had mixed fortunes in Saturday's game, with Pariyo scoring two tries while Kizza was left on the bench.
The club was contacted by Communities First - a Welsh Government body focused on tackling poverty - to ask if the players could join and Mr Sweeney said the club agreed.
He added: "One of the players approached our coach and mentioned he played a bit of rugby.
"It was noticed he was an extra gifted rugby player and we spoke to him about why he was here. It transpired he had been at the Commonwealth Games playing for Uganda and while here he and his mate decided to seek asylum."
The pair have reportedly claimed asylum because of personal and political reasons, with an unnamed source saying they are "petrified" of a "potential backlash against them".
The Uganda Rugby Union is reportedly unhappy with their move and have accused the pair of "running away".
Coach Yayiro Kasasa said: "They have not sought our authority as a union, they have not been cleared by the union.
"What happened is that when we came for the Commonwealth Games we signed a code of conduct in order to come over.
"But they never returned to Uganda, they ran away. They remained in the UK and broke our code of conduct."
The game's international body World Rugby and the Home Office declined to comment on the case.
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