good sport Nadhir Zoma
good sport Nadhir Zoma looks back at an amazing career BY WEAM NAMOU Nadhir Zoma looks over an old photo album, which includes this picture from 1976 when he met Muhammad Ali, who was visiting Pontiac. Nadhir Zoma had a passion for soccer since he was a 10-year-old in Baghdad. But it turned out to be the sport of wrestling where he found his greatest success. Born in Baghdad in 1948, Zoma immigrated to the United States with his family in 1968. A few years later he cofounded the Iraqi team, whose name was changed to the Chaldean Iraqi American Sports Club. In 1971, the Iraqi team won the league championship in Detroit with Zoma scoring the most goals, 36. From 1971 to 1972, he played for the University of Detroit soccer team and won the All State Michigan Colleges Soccer Championship, also known as the State of Michigan Cup. Then something occurred in 1976 that changed the direction of his sports career. One of his Iraqi friends, Amir Ismail Hakki, then the head of the Arab Wrestling Federation, was playing for the World Cup in Minnesota. Zoma invited Hakki to Michigan for a friendly youth match with what was then called the American Amateur Youth Wrestling Federation. “The Federation soon elected me as a board member and later, in 1977, when the wrestling team was invited to play in Iran, they appointed me as the team leader since I’m originally from the Middle East,” he said. ““As a team leader in wrestling, wherever you went you were respected and treated like a king.” After playing in Iran, the team went to Germany and Turkey and lastly to Iraq. In Iraq, Zoma met his wife, Nadia. Before they got married, he told her, “Nadia, I’m involved in sports. I’m always going to go out of town.’” She supported his lifestyle, so they got married on a Thursday — and on Friday she went to stay at her mother’s home as he went to Kuwait for a sports meeting. “I was the only Chaldean or Arab with a team of Americans,” he said. “Being a team leader in wrestling is something to really be proud of.” At the end of each trip, the youth were given a survey. One of the questions asked was, if you went out of the country again, who would you want to be your team leader and your coach? They responded, Mr. Zoma. “I was honored and surprised,” he said. He was also honored by a medal given to him in Iran by one of the Shah’s sons, the Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, a teenager at the time. The medal had a picture of his mom and dad, the Shah of Iran and his wife. Zoma continued to tour with the wrestling team until his brother’s death in 1980. “He was shot and killed in a store in Hamtramck,” he said. “This was an emotionally difficult time for me and my family so I stopped traveling with the wrestling federation.” Locally, however, he remained involved in sports. He served as general secretary of the Iraqi Chaldean Club, was elected to Michigan’s Soccer Association, and was appointed Cup Commissioner of the tournaments in the United States. In 1984, when he was elected to be part of the Iraqi delegation to the Olympics in Los Angeles, he returned to touring different countries. The soccer team went to Iraq three times, the wrestling team went once, and Zoma went for a total of 15 times to Iraq. His last trip to Iraq, in 1980, was eye-opening. “The situation in Iraq was very tough because we beat the Iraqis in Baghdad and in Basra,” he said. “The last match we had, they started switching the wrestlers on us.” In the morning, Iraqi officials applied the right rules. Each wrestler was weighed and saw who his opponent would be. In the evening, however, a different Iraqi appeared for the match. “In the morning a teenager of appropriate size for the opponent would show up, but then in the evening, someone who’s in his mid-20s that’s a lot heavier would come to wrestle one of our youth,” said Zoma. “I went up to the men in charge and said, ‘that’s not the same guy that got weighed in in the morning.’ They said, ‘Please Nadhir, let this go for our sake.’ I knew that they were scared because it would bring shame on them to lose all matches and maybe there would be a punishment. I explained to my coach the situation and we let them win.” This volunteer work has brought Zoma a great deal of joy and many adventures, including meeting such sports figures as the legendary boxer Muhammad Ali, famous soccer players Pele and George Best, and others. Zoma has also produced several sports magazines and brochures for decades, including publications for soccer World Cups 1986, 1994 and 2014. He was appointed as an administrative member of the Iraqi Olympic delegation at the Olympics in Los Angeles and just this part May was named one of the Hall of Fame wrestling members in the American Union at a ceremony at the Michigan State Fairgrounds Coliseum with 600 attendants. “Some of the kids I coached came to the ceremony,” he said. “They were in their 40s and I didn’t recognize them, but they recognized me. I had not changed physically the way they did.” 42 CHALDEAN NEWS AUGUST 2016
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