Japan Ambassador to Kenya visits Dadaab to Support the Refugee Youth

Dadaab – The Japan Ambassador to Kenya, HE Toshitsugu Uesawa, visited Dadaab Refugee Camps and donated footballs, uniforms and pumps to youth teams as part of the ‘Sport for Tomorrow’ initiative announced by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2013.

‘Sport for Tomorrow’ is an international contribution through sport initiative jointly implemented by public and private sectors, which promotes sport to more than 10 million people in over 100 nations until 2020, the year when Tokyo will host the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games. The initiative aims to deliver values of sport and promote the Olympic and Paralympic movement to people of all generations worldwide.

The Ambassador who was accompanied by UNHCR Kenya Country Representative, Mr. Raouf Mazou, witnessed a football match between Ifo and Hagadera camps teams in which the latter emerged victorious through a solitary goal scored in the second half.

In his speech, the Ambassador pledged Japan’s continued support to refugees and hoped that the contribution would help in the healthy growth of the youth in Dadaab Refugee Camps and the Host Communities.

“We would like to thank the people of Japan for their passion about youth programmes for refugees and their hosts,” Said Mr. Mazou. He also reiterated Japan’s status as UNHCR’s fourth largest contributor globally.

The Japan Ambassador to Kenya HE Toshitsugu Uesawa with one of the football teams in Dadaab UNHCR/A.Nasrullah

Dadaab Refugee Camps have a total of 264 senior and junior youth teams engaged in various sports ranging from football, volleyball and athletics.

All sports teams per camp are managed by a well-structured and established youth sports committees, which are composed of a duly elected executive committee headed by a Sports Chairperson and his or her Vice.

These sports committees have been trained by Sports Aid Africa, and periodically by the Tegla Loroupe Peace Foundation for capacity building and skills enhancement.

Most often refugees cannot speak the language of the host country for many different reasons and are faced with difficulties to effectively integrate into local communities.
Sports is a universal language of values; values of respect, dignity, diversity, equality, tolerance and fairness, which contribute to combat all forms of discrimination and promote youth social inclusion, peace building and peaceful coexistence among the youths in the camps which forms part of the core values for peer education and peer support for positive behaviour change.