MADRID, 8 May. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The LaLiga Foundation presented this Tuesday the new initiative ‘La Ligue D’Égalité-Kenia’ that will develop a social football league in the community of Kibera, one of the most disadvantaged neighborhoods in Nairobi, capital of Kenya, and where the most of 250,000 people in poverty and without access to basic services and in overcrowded conditions.
The initiative, which was presented at the central ParkInn hotel in Nairobi, will see the launch of a sports and training program aimed at more than 400 girls from the city for six months, with the help of the NGO IBL, LaLiga and its Foundation. zone.
“A program in which football and the values of sport, such as camaraderie, tolerance, sportsmanship and respect, will be integrated into the daily life of society, with the aim of improving their quality of life and community coexistence,” explained LaLiga.
It will be the second activation of the ‘La Ligue D’Égalité’ project, which has already been taking place in Cameroon for three years, with the aim of creating the first regulated football league in the country for girls under 17 years of age.
The event was attended by businessmen, media and representatives of the city’s main organizations. The LaLiga delegate in Kenya, Álvaro Abreu, explained the details of the agreement with IBL, as well as the birth process of this initiative and the calendar of sporting and training activities planned for the coming months.
Abreu highlighted the important presence that LaLiga will have in this competition, in which the 22 participating teams will each have the name of a LaLiga Hypermotion club, demonstrating the deep roots of this region in football, a sport that is increasingly generates more expectation in the East African country. The project will have continuous logistical, organizational and sports material support from LaLiga for the “correct functioning of the activities to be carried out.”
This competition will have a notable social and community responsibility character, since sports points will be earned not only on the playing field, but also in various monthly activations of garbage collections and educational workshops on the topics with the greatest impact in their region such as They are premature pregnancies, menstrual hygiene or decent work opportunities, among others.
For its part, the LaLiga Foundation will develop training for 25 coaches of the competition teams guided by the foundation’s own methodology ‘Values to Win’, and focused on the transmission of values through football during childhood.
In addition, this entity will cover 22 school scholarships (one per team) for those girls participating in the project with greater family vulnerability and better attitude and commitment during training and matches.
The director of the LaLiga Foundation, Olga de la Fuente, considers that the implementation of this initiative of social integration through the values of football means “providing real opportunities for personal and sporting growth” to a multitude of girls in “a situation vulnerable”, so they are “very grateful” to be able to contribute their grain of sand.
For his part, the CEO of IBL, Erick Juma, assured that this initiative is “fantastic news” in a “very complicated” context. “I have witnessed how many girls dropped out of school and entered into difficult life situations because of their families, in an environment lacking basic needs and role models,” he lamented.
“I always thought that football would be a tool to change things, so we are very happy that LaLiga and the LaLiga Foundation have decided to join us and help us transform our community, bringing hope and giving our girls a positive vision of tomorrow,” he added.