LIRIM HAJRULLAHU: FROM A REFUGEE TO A TWO-TIME GREY CUP CHAMPION

Last week, Kicker Lirim Hajrullahu was seen on the football field holding the Grey Cup with Toronto Argonauts. Hajrullahu is completing his 11th professional CFL season with the Argonauts and will go on to play in his third Grey Cup. But before he was a professional football player, he was a young boy with a big dream in a small country in the heart of Europe, caught in the middle of war. Kosovo.

Given his background, Lirim's name comes with a story. 'Lirim' meaning freedom, fitting for the family at such a historically challenging time. Lirim named following the release of 14 Albanians from Serbia’s prison at the time of his birth, including a Politician and Lawyer. According to a report by International Crisis Group, during those times several thousands of Albanians would find themselves in Serbia’s prisons for political reasons including activism, freedom of speech violations by Serbia and for even just uttering words in their mother tongue, Albanian.

But the young boy from Gjilan, Kosovo was raised in the town of Perlepnica; a town of activists, famous politicians and artists. Little did the family know that his name would also be fitting to his very own experience where he became a child of war in 1999 during Serbia’s ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. Hajrullahu would be spending nearly a month in Macedonia's refugee camp before coming to Kingston, Ontario during ‘Operation Parasol’ Canada’s emergency program in response to UNHCR in airlifting over 5,000 refugees. As for the political arrests by Serbian forces during the conflict, according to ICG, Albanians that were detained were transferred to Serbian jails and penitentiaries following the reached agreement that brought the NATO air campaign to an end and requesting the withdrawal of all Serbian forces from Kosovo bringing the war to a halt.

As Operation Parasol marked 25 years this year reminding 34-year-old Hajrullahu of challenging and humbling beginnings, professionally, this season, he made a return to the Toronto Agronauts setting career highs in the field. He told The Toronto Star, “As a kicker you strive for those moments, you want to be put in those positions where guys trust you to make those final kicks,” he said. He began his professional career in 2014 starting out with the Winnipeg Bombers where he’s played at U.S. teams as well such as with the Los Angeles Rams, Carolina, Washington, and Dallas.