A group of youth from the Youth Capacity Building Project, affiliated to the Forum for Intercultural Dialogue under the auspices of the Coptic Evangelical Organization, organized, yesterday, Thursday, the “Ahalina Dialogue” sports initiative for dialogue in Alexandria Governorate. The initiative’s activities took place on the fields of the stadium of the University City in Alexandria, in cooperation with the Fellowship Fund for University Workers.
The event was attended by Sheikh Ibrahim Al-Jamal, Director of Preaching at Al-Azhar Al-Sharif; Representative Engineer Ihab Zakaria, the Senator; Khaled Anwar, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Fellowship Fund, and the representatives of the Coptic Evangelical Organization.
The initiative aims to establishing a set of principles, the most important of which is the acceptance of the other and religious tolerance through football, to create a kind of communication and cultural dialogue between the young people participating from civil and charitable societies, the representatives of civil society in Alexandria, and who belong to different neighborhoods and geographical areas in the governorate, including (Agami – Shatby – Azarita – Smouha – Attarin – Ezbet Saad – Anfoushi) as well as a gathering of diverse educational, knowledge and professional backgrounds and different cultures, away from any form of discrimination based on religion, geographic scope, societal environment or culture.
The initiative included a number of sports teams representing the NGOs participating in the initiative, with different specializations and interests in Alexandria, from different cultural and geographic backgrounds, forming various football teams, which creates a kind of acquaintance and cultural and societal dialogue and removes false and improper mental images that is mutually present among the residents of the different areas in the governorate, with the aim of completing the cultural dialogue and sportive interaction, which is the main objective of this initiative.
The day included several matches, where the “Haretna Almisreya Team for Sustainable Development” won first place in the “Ahalina Dialogue” initiative, Sports for Dialogue, and the cups, shields and medals were handed over to the winning teams and the participants in a distinguished closing ceremony and memorial photos were taken.
