KAMPALA, Uganda -- John Paul Ofwono is so tall he can pick mangoes without climbing trees and has scared off government soldiers who believed he was a towering ghost spirit.
The 30-year-old from eastern Uganda measures 8 feet, 2 inches and may be the world's tallest man, the country's state-owned newspaper New Vision reported Friday.According to the Guinness Book of Records, the tallest man for whom there was irrefutable evidence was American Robert Wadlow, who was 8 feet, 11 inches and died in 1940. It lists living men in the United States and Britain at just over 7 feet, 6 inches each but gives no current global record.
Ofwono's height has made him part of folklore in his village of Yokolo.
During a rebel insurgency led by the spirit medium Alice Lakwena in eastern Uganda in the mid-1980s, Ofwono frightened away well-armed government soldiers who took him for the ghost spirit of Lakwena.
The New Vision on Friday showed a photograph of Ofwono towering over his father.
But Ofwono, who weighs a hefty 322 pounds, has found more grief than joy.
New Vision said he was a primary school dropout, has been shunned by the women of his village and is in poor health.