In the conveyor belt of Tunisian distance swimming power, Rami Rahmouni looked poised to be the next rising star. Rahmouni, 16 years of age, first made headlines for winning the 1500 at the 2023 Arab Games. He currently boasts a best time of 15:05.43, the 4th fastest in Tunisian history behind heavyweights Ahmed Hafnaoui, Oussama Mellouli, and Ahmed Jaouadi.
Rahmouni’s future in his country’s dynasty is now in question after a sudden relocation and reported citizenship talks with Saudi Arabia.
According to Arab sports publication winwin, Rahmouni unexpectedly left his training post in France under Philippe Lucas, who also coached Hafnaoui and Jaouadi. After a few days of his absence, multiple sources reported that he was in Saudi Arabia. He reportedly is training in a private pool with tight security measures that prohibit filming.
Tunisian sports club Espérance, which Rahmouni competed under, described the relocation as “opaque” and “sports smuggling”. The club’s swimming head, Hichem Najjar, added that Rahmouni’s parents were in talks with Saudi officials for their son’s potential naturalization to Saudi citizenship for “a large sum of money”.
Najjar went on to say that he worries about the precedent this sets, calling on the Tunisian Ministry of Sport to take action.
“Once this door is opened, it cannot be closed,” Najjar said.
Watch Najjar’s full interview (in Arabic) here.
Under Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 initiative, the nation has been paying and granting citizenship to elite athletes in several sports, such as U.S. soccer player Maryami Al-Tamimi.
Another nation that has made headlines for cutting deals with foreign athletes to compete under their flag is Turkey. The country recently recruited several track & field Olympic medalists from Jamaica.
Rahmouni and his family have not made a public statement yet. The Tunisian Swimming Federation posted this statement on Facebook:
“Notice:
The Tunisian University of Swimming is following with interest what is being circulated on social media platforms about the situation of the promising swimmer Rami Al Rahmouni, and would like to provide the following explanations for public opinion:☆ The university, under the supervision of the Ministry of Youth and Sports, ensured to grant swimmer Rami Al-Rahmouni special care in view of his promising talent, as the Ministry granted him an exceptional goals contract titled 2023 at the age of fourteen, emphasizing confidence in his technical abilities and the Ministry granted this support with a title of the year 2024☆ Within the framework of continuing this care, the Ministry has prepared a contract of goals entitled 2025, similar to the contract granted to the Olympic champion Ahmed Al-Jawadi, which is a great faith in his future. However, this contract has not yet been signed by his guardian despite several explanatory sessions and official correspondences sent to him.☆ When he was injured in Paris, the doctor of the national team and the National Centre for Medicine and Sports Sciences took care of his medical follow-up and fully qualified him, his own training facilities were also allocated to the Brades Olympic Pool, and a national coach was placed under his disposal until 30 August 2025, to ensure his return in the best condition.☆ All these efforts have come within the framework of a strategic plan aimed at preparing swimmer Rami Rahmoni for the honorable participation in international events, and most importantly the Youth Olympic Games – Dakar 2026, through the World Championship.The Tunisian University of Swimming flaunts the Heritage and lack of context behind any unreliable information, reaffirms that the Tunisian State institutions remain constantly supportive of its champions and promising athletes, and work to provide all possibilities to ensure their superiority and achievement of sporting achievements that raise the flag of Tunisia high.”
i saw rami training in Riyadh pool but no offcial move that he is going saudi also he went with an academy which pays talent they posted him but then deleted after it
Jon Rudd tried the same tactic when he arrived in Ireland.
Next he will be fat shaming them!
There are certain coaches you can always count on to poach your swimmers.
Spill the tea please
Wasn’t Djokovic offered a ton of money to represent GB at the beginning of his career and he rejected it?
Thought that Draganja had an offer from a country with a big oil reserve, could be wrong and I don’t remember which country in the middle east that it was.
Yes, he did and it was Qatar.
No, he was offered standard Lawn Tennis player funding from then CEO Roger Draper (Jack Draper’s father) as the ATP doesn’t require citizenship of a country to represent it (at least it didn’t then – shocking really), so all he had to do was live in the UK for 2 years and he’d have been eligible to play for Britain at the end of that time. Novak’s mother initiated the deal and wanted to make a financial deal but the LTA weren’t willing to offer more than player funding once the move had been made, and the UK government were not willing to grant him citizenship to fastrack his move so he was going to be made to wait 6yrs… Read more »
From a swimming standpoint, maybe he made his calculations that come LA 28, he would need to have better PBs than Jaouadi and Hafnaoui just to qualify, which is not guaranteed.
And unfortunately, they all swim the same events.
I’d so you maybe correct. Sounds like he was getting a LOT of support in Tunisia according to the letter above. A lot more than swimmers in other nations.
That + 💰💰💰💰💰💰
No brainer for me.
I’d have done the same but I’d ask for more money lol.
South Africans Roland Schoeman and Ryk Neethling were both offered 6 million USD and 3 millions USD contracts respectively to swim for Qatar in 2005.
If you were in their place, would you also turn it down for national pride and patriotism ?
My guess (or actually pure conjecture) is that the big reason they were offered the money was that they were part of the 400 Free Relay that won Olympic Gold in 2004 in a new World record, and they were out of college (Roland 23/24 and Ryk 26) so getting into the prime age for swimming. But since the relay had done that well and with Lyndon (19) and Darian (20) still young they were probably dreaming and hope to be able to repeat that in 2008 and that might have been why they turned down the money.
The Gulf States and Türkiye have been buying athletes in other sports for some time now, the Turkish athletics (Track) team will basically be a Jamaica-Nigeria select team in LA, so I guess it was only a matter of time. Still, how humiliating for those countries – All that wealth, all those people, and unable to produce athletes of calibre in any sport.
You should only be able to compete for a country if you were a citizen from birth, gained citizenship through ancestors as a birth right, or have lived there permanently for at least 3 years and become a naturalised citizen. It’s a farce that Türkiye will be represented by sprinters who’ve never stepped foot in the country and have no ancestral ties.
I think Track and Field might still have the 3 years period where you have to sit out before representing a new country so Rajinda Campbell from Jamaica (shot put) could not participate in today’s (this years) World Championship
Yes, but you don’t have to relocate, they never had to step foot in the country that buys them, it’s insanity. I suspect we’ll see more of this as the Gulf States look to hosting the Olympics in the next few decades.
they were stealing Ukrainian swimmers actually but in the long run it didn’t help them
This is growing the NCAA transfer portal to the Olympic stage.
I’m sorta surprised that we don’t yet have a branch campus, such as Univ of Texas Tunisia, or Univ of California Tunisia.
They (these Tunisian swimmers) did a lot of their training (HS age) in France
You know that is already a thing, right?
New York University (NYU): Has campuses in Abu Dhabi and Shanghai.
Georgetown University: Has a campus in Qatar.
Carnegie Mellon University: Has a campus in Qatar.
Webster University: Operates campuses in Vienna, Geneva, Leiden, and more.
Northwestern University: Has a campus in Qatar.
University of Evansville: Has a campus in England.
Duke University: Co-founded Duke Kunshan University in China.
The University of Maryland, College Park: Has a location in Germany.
Etc etc