Nairobi, 26 May, 2023 / 9:20 pm (ACI Africa).
The Focolare Movement and the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) have partnered to organize “Sports4Peace”, sports festivals targeting 12-18-year-olds from refugee and migrant communities in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, and Kakuma, a town in Northwestern Kenya, Lodwar Catholic Diocese, which has hosted a UNHCR Refugee Camp since 1992.
The “Sports4Peace” initiative is to involve six sports festivals between May and August, the first scheduled to take place on Saturday, May 27 at Mariapolis Piero in Juja, the developer of the initiative told ACI Africa about the event’s venue that is some 27 kilometers North of Nairobi city.
The focus of the sports “is on cooperative social competencies”, Dr. Alois Hechenberger said during the Thursday, May 25 interview.
Dr. Hechenberger added that the highlighted competencies are developed in the participants “through games, sports, and not through talking”.
“It is a holistic approach; the senses, hands, and heart are involved. They experience peace with positive experiences of interaction. They should then take this back to their schools and their neighborhoods,” he explained about the initiative that has previously been realized in South Sudan and Burundi.