Aiyeku Timothy
The 2020 edition of the Soccer For Peace tournament organized by the Cardinal Onaiyekan Foundation for Peace, COFP, Foundation will be parading 12 female teams across the federation.
After witnessing two previous editions with male football teams, this year will showcase women football, including grassroots and All-Stars teams respectively.
However, the opening game between the FCT Female team and the FCT selected ended in a 2-0 victory for the former with Kalu Nleni and Favour Kalu scoring in each half respectively at the Papa’s ground, Kubwa Express Road, Abuja.
While the Waco Queens team enjoyed a 3-0 advantage over the Fosla Academy team.
In an interview with AIYEKU TIMOTHY, an Abuja-based journalist, after observing the ceremonial kickoff, the Executive Director, Sr. Agatha Chikeleu said the initiative was born from the desire to promote peace among young people as well as imbibe the spirit of unity using football.
According to her, female teams were paraded in this year’s edition to carry them along in the peace project.
Her words “COFP is a kind of foundation that is very gender sensitive. The first and second editions of the tournament were all male football so this time around, we decided to balance it by fielding females because we know that ladies are into football and they are doing it well. So it will be an opportunity to encourage more young girls to come out for that and above all, we feel that if we are talking about peace, everybody must be involved, it shouldn’t just be about men alone.
“Women should be involved because we all have roles to play and are all involved . that is the reason why we fell it is very important to bring in women as peace building” she ended.
Other teams involved in the tournament are Garden City, Generations Next FC, Gwagwalada Selected and Josiah Angels.
Niger Amazons, UCON Angels, YES Diamond and Santos Soccer Queens also complete the list.
The tournament starts on 21st February and ends on March 21, 2020.
