The Price of Olympic Competition - The New York Times Opinion Page - August 28, 2008

There have been a lot of posts here about various wrinkles in Olympic competition: medal count, citizenship flexibility, outlying statistics, etc.

Here's perhaps the smallest wrinkle of all, but one that I found fascinating. It falls under the "citizenship flexibility" category and concerns one Olympic athlete's name.

I watched the women's 1,500-meter final, and one of the competitors - she wound up finishing fifth - was Maryam Yusuf Jamal from Bahrain.

It turns out she was born in Ethiopia, a running Mecca, and that Bahrain persuaded her to race under its flag. The twist is that she was born into the Christian tribe of Oromo and was named Zenebech Tola. According to her Wikipedia page, which seems pretty well supported by other sources, Bahrain granted her citizenship in exchange that she change her name to an Arabic one and that she compete in the Asian Games in Doha, Qatar, in 2006. She was allowed to keep her religion, though.

[Was it OK for Bahrain to ask Tola to change her name in exchange for citizenship?]

[One reader replied: When the lady is denied her God given talent and natural rights to exercise in Ethiopia, it is appropriate to accept the name Mariyam Yesuf Jamal. The point is that, what she had lost being born to Tola in Ethiopia, she gained by becoming Jamal in Bahrain.] Weigh in on this topic here.