Francis Kompaon, born 16 January 1986 in Rabaul

Rabaul

Rabaul is a township in East New Britain province, Papua New Guinea. The town was the provincial capital and most important settlement in the province until it was destroyed in 1994 by falling ash of a volcanic eruption. During the eruption, ash was sent thousands of metres into the air and the...

, is a Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea , officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands...

n athlete

Track and field

Track and field is a sport comprising various competitive athletic contests based around the activities of running, jumping and throwing. The name of the sport derives from the venue for the competitions: a stadium which features an oval running track surrounding a grassy area...

.

He represented Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea at the 2008 Summer Paralympics

Papua New Guinea sent a delegation to compete at the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing. The country was represented by two athletes, Francis Kompaon and Joyleen Jeffrey, both competing in track and field...

 at the 2008 Summer Paralympics

2008 Summer Paralympics

The 2008 Summer Paralympic Games, the thirteenth Paralympics, took place in Beijing, China from September 6 to September 17, 2008. As with the 2008 Summer Olympics, equestrian events were held in Hong Kong and sailing events in Qingdao....

 in Beijing

Beijing

Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

, competing in athletics in the one hundred metre sprint, T42 category. With a time of 11.10 seconds, he finished second in the final, five hundredths of a second behind Australia

Australia at the 2008 Summer Paralympics

Australia sent a delegation to compete at the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing. The country sent 121 officials and 170 athletes in 13 sports to Beijing. It was the country's largest ever Paralympic delegation...

's Heath Francis

Heath Francis

Heath Francis is an Australian athlete who has participated in the 2000, 2004 and 2008 Summer Paralympics. At the 2008 Beijing Paralympics he became the first arm amputee athlete to win the sprint treble at a Paralympics, a feat he accomplished 2 years earlier at the 2006 IPC World...

. It was Papua New Guinea's first ever Olympic or Paralympic medal, and only the second ever Olympic or Paralympic medal won by a Pacific Islander; Tonga

Tonga

Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...

n boxer Paea Wolfgramm had won a silver at the 1996 Olympics. He also competed in the 200 metre sprint, finishing ninth overall in the heats, with a time of 23.30 seconds. Kompaon was his country's flagbearer

2008 Summer Paralympics national flag bearers

During the Parade of Nations at the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Paralympic Games, athletes from each participating country paraded in the stadium, preceded by their flag. The flag was borne by a sportsperson from that country chosen either by the National Paralympic Committee or by the...

 at the Games' opening ceremony

2008 Summer Paralympics opening ceremony

The 2008 Summer Paralympics opening ceremony was held at the Beijing National Stadium on September 6, 2008 just two weeks after the end of the 2008 Summer Olympics. The event was themed "One World, One Dream" and "Transcendence, Integration, Equality." The show was attended by about 91,000 to...

, and was one of fifteen competitors (out of over 4000) selected to carry the torch during the Paralympic torch relay

2008 Summer Paralympics Torch Relay

The torch relay for the 2008 Summer Paralympic Games was held between August 28 and September 6 in eleven cities, and also included the tomb of Yellow Emperor.- Planned Route :In 2007, the BOCOG announced the torch relay route, composed of three parts:...

 in Beijing.

He had previously won several gold medals at regional competitions in Oceania

Oceania

Oceania is a region centered on the islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean. Conceptions of what constitutes Oceania range from the coral atolls and volcanic islands of the South Pacific to the entire insular region between Asia and the Americas, including Australasia and the Malay Archipelago...

, and had finished fourth in the 200m sprint for élite athletes with disabilities at the 2006 Commonwealth Games

2006 Commonwealth Games

The 2006 Commonwealth Games were held in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia between 15 March and 26 March 2006. It was the largest sporting event to be staged in Melbourne, eclipsing the 1956 Summer Olympics in terms of the number of teams competing, athletes competing, and events being held.The site...

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Papua New Guinea's sports minister Dame Carol Kidu

Carol Kidu

Dame Carol Kidu, Lady Kidu, DBE is an Australian-born Papua New Guinean politician. She is the only current female member of Parliament, and served as Minister for Community Development under Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare from 2002 to 2011...

 said that Kompaon's Paralympic medal had "raised the issue of disability in Papua New Guinea to a level that it has never been". In direct response to Kompaon's medal, Prime Minister Michael Somare

Michael Somare

Sir Michael Thomas Somare, GCL, GCMG, CH, CF, KStJ, MP was Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea from 2002 to 2011; he had previously been Prime Minister from independence in 1975 until 1980 and again from 1982 until 1985. Somare's first two terms were as a member of the Pangu Party, but he then...

 promised that the government would increase funding for disability sports.

In 2009, Kompaon enrolled in sports management at Griffith University

Griffith University

Griffith University is a public, coeducational, research university located in the southeastern region of the Australian state of Queensland. The university has five satellite campuses located in the Gold Coast, Logan City and in the Brisbane suburbs of Mount Gravatt, Nathan and South Bank. Current...

 in Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

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External links

• "Photo: Torchbearer Francis Kompaon displays the torch", Xinhua, 6 September 2008
• "Australia's Heath Francis, facing, celebrates with Papua New Guinea's Francis Kompaon (1853) after the Men's 100m T46 final at the Beijing 2008 Paraly" [sic], Associated Press
  Associated Press
  The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
  
  photo, 15 September 2008