An African man who has emerged as a basketball star at a high school in Canada is supposedly 30 years old.
Jonathan Nicola, who left South Sudan and arrived in Windsor, Ontario last November, was arrested Wednesday at the Canadian border. The Windsor Star reports that Nicola was still being held by the Canada Border Services Agency as of Wednesday afternoon for allegedly contravening the Immigration Refugee Protection Act. The agency did not elaborate on what Nicola was accused of doing.
Nicola said back in January that he turned 17 on Nov. 25, 2015. He also spoke about diseases and war in his home country of South Sudan and the long process he went through to obtain a Canadian student visa.
“A few of my friends know of my background, how we live over there,” Nicola explained at the time. “I don’t know how many of them have a clue of how it is in Africa. With the war going on, terrorism and all this, they make it real double hard (to obtain a visa).”
Authorities believe Nicola is 30. Catholic Central High School spokesman Stephen Fields said the school cannot comment on Nicola’s case.
“Generally I can tell you that we have a system of checks and balances in place that whenever international students are coming into any of our schools, we make sure that they have all of the necessary government documentation that they require in order to be in one of our schools,” said Fields. “Again, generally speaking, if we felt at any time that there is any kind of threat to any of our students at any of our schools, then we would act appropriately.”
Nicola stands at 6-foot-9 and is enrolled as an 11th grader. Catholic Central basketball coach Pete Cusumano said a few months ago that he believes Nicola has a shot at going pro.
Whenever we hear that minors who are playing sports have lied about their age, there is one story that comes to mind. You have feel sorry for Nicola for the situation he came from, but there are going to be a lot of furious people if it is determined that he is, in fact, a 30-year-old man.
