For athletes with intellectual disabilities the schedule ahead is eventful, Abeer Anwar reports Ayman Abdel-Wahab, Special Olympics (SO) president and regional managing director of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, this week flew to SO headquarters in the US to attend the annual meeting of the managing directors of the world's seven continents. Abdel-Wahab discussed MENA participation in the World Winter Games to be staged in North Korea in 2013 from 26 January to 6 February. MENA is due to participate with 411 players in seven winter sports. Special Olympics Egypt will be represented by 32 athletes. SO Egypt was the only organisation in the country which held what it said were free and fair elections after the 25 January Revolution to choose its members and a new board representing the various authorities and societies that deal with the mentally disabled across Egypt. Abdel-Wahab also held a meeting in Lebanon to discuss MENA's strategy which targets attracting more players by the end of a five-year plan that is due to end in 2015. The MENA region is facing a number of problems following the uprisings of the Arab Spring which markedly affected athletes and their sports. He also discussed the participation of the region in the first ever Special Olympics Unified World Cup to take place in Brazil in 2013, one year before the World Cup which Brazil is hosting. Each region will be represented by four teams and the region will hold a number of qualifiers to choose the region's representatives. He also invited all regional football stars to become ambassadors of the region and help SO athletes prepare "for such a glorious event as will other stars all over the world." One such star is Brazilian football ace and FC Barcelona defender Dani Alves Da Silva who has been appointed a Special Olympics ambassador for global football. As an SO ambassador Alves is charged with promoting greater inclusion and respect for athletes with intellectual disabilities in the game of football worldwide. "Football changed my life. It has opened more opportunities for me and has shaped me as a man," says Alves. "As an ambassador for Special Olympics I want to play my part in ensuring that more and more athletes with intellectual disabilities have the chance to transform their own lives through the joy of football, achieving greater things both on and off the pitch. And in turn, they will inspire us all with their courage and spirit." Football is the largest sport in Special Olympics with more than 435,000 athletes and 206 accredited programmes worldwide. Alves will champion the SO global football programme, whose main aim is to bring football to a total of one million players with intellectual disabilities worldwide. The programme has also set out to increase the quality of coaching and help athletes build skills they can use on and off the field of play, while connecting with a fan base of footballers around the world to raise vital funds for the movement. Brady Lum, president and COO of Special Olympics welcomed Alves' appointment. "It is estimated that only one in 500 children with an intellectual disability will be given the chance to play football due to being seen by their peers as being 'different' or 'without ability'. Now, one of the world's best defenders is on our team, defending the right of people with intellectual disabilities to equal opportunities in sport," Lum said. Alves joins a league of football heroes who have all enthusiastically thrown their support behind the Special Olympics global football initiative. They include Osvaldo Ardilles, Enrique Borja, Teofilo Cubillas, Desiree Ellis, Lori Fair, Kaka, Christian Karembeu, Hidetoshi Nakata, Lucas Radebe, Romario, Clarence Seedorf, Javier Zanetti, and Zico. Special Olympics team ambassadors include Inter-Milan from Italy, UK Premier League Club Tottenham Hotspur, and Club Corinthians Paulista from Brazil.
