Panathlon International

We learn the sad news of the passing of our friend William Saad Abdulnur, former President of District Brazil, member of the Expansion Commission, President of the Club of Taubaté and currently past president of the Club of Taubaté.

He served as International Board Member in the years 2019-2020.

The family of Panathlon International offers its deepest condolences to the family and the entire District Brazil. 

Panathlon Lisbon will be celebrating its 41st birthday online on the 17th.

Unfortunately, COVID limited  physical celebrations with the members but they will receive some gifts (see photo) and they will gather on 17TH  on zoom to celebrate the anniversary in this rather different way.

The club communicated also that  the "Prémio Panathlon Clube de Lisboa" award will be given to Prof. José Manuel Constantino, who is a long-time friend of Panathlon Lisbon. Prof. Constantino is also the President of the Portuguese Olympic Committee.

Also, the fair-play award "Fair-Play Mário Simas" will be given to David Livramento, that is a cyclist, for his action during a race in which an accident occurred, where he was also involved but he didn't fall of his bicycle. However, one colleague fell down and David stopped his race to help him back on track. This is not the first time that David shows positive sporting behaviours and thus he will receive the Prize.

Finally and for the first time, Panathlon Lisbon created a support program for associations of different etiology that clearly promote the values of sport, namely Fair Play and Ethics in Sport.

Panathlon members will be able to propose entities whose program they understand to comply with the aforementioned values and, among the proposals, the winner annually will be awarded a monetary prize in the amount of 1,500 € (one thousand and five hundred euros).

The designation of “General Rodolfo Begonha Award”, aims to honor in a very simple way the main worker in the creation of the club and whose participation in the activities in the Panathlon movement remain full of vigour and dynamism. 

The Panathlon Club of Como doesn't stop.

The 31st Youth Prize awarded to Giulio Campioni, 18 years old, of Canottieri Lario.

The awarding ceremony would have coincided, as per tradition, with the Christmas party of the Club of Como, scheduled for 10 December, but it has been postponed because of the health emergency to the first possible convivial meeting of 2021.

In this period of health emergency, in order to compact the Area 03, Governor Maurizio Nasi requested to the Clubs' Press Officers some sports articles, short reports on topics treated in the few convivial meetings of the current year, summaries of conventions, seminars, round tables on sports topics, presentation/review of sports books or sports films by Members or speakers, which have been collected in the attached Newsletter.

After the opening session of the 16th Conference of Ministers responsible for Sport of the Council of Europe and the introductory session focused on the revision of the European Charter for Sport (5 November 2020), the third online session of this conference ("Human rights in sport") took place on Monday 7 December (10.00-11.30 CET). 

The session was open only to invited delegations and observers, for Panathlon International participated the General Secretary Simona Callo. 

This introductory session was moderated by André-Noël Chaker and included insights into human rights issues such as the right to a fair trial, the protection of children and the economic and social rights of athletes. Speakers included:

Tiina Kivisaari, Director of Sport, Ministry of Education and Culture, Finland 

Marko Bošnjak, Judge, European Court of Human Rights 

Claudia Bokel, President of the German Fencing Federation, former President of the IOC Athletes Commission 

Pierre Cornu, President, Foundation Board, International Centre for Sport Studies (CIES) 

The session was opened by Lefteris Avgenakis, Deputy Minister for Culture and Sport, Greece

Panathlon participated, through Patrick Van Camphenhout, International Board Member, and Paul Standaert, President of the Belgian District, in the EWOS 2020 (# BEACTIVE) awards ceremony which was held in digital.

About 200 delegations and many personalities were present:

Mariya Gabriel, European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth.

Tomasz Frankowski, Member of the European Parliament, Vice-President of the Sports Group.

The EU received 95 projects from 26 different European countries. Finally, 3 categories were awarded :

- BEACTIVE- Education Award: Petra Preradovića Primary school, Croatia.

- BEACTIVE- Workplace Award: House of Code, Denmark

- # BEACTIVE- Local Hero Award: Tomás Slavata, Czech Republic

In addition to some testimonials from the 2019 winners and their other accomplishments, participants attended a beautiful performance by a dancer and a contemporary bicycle acrobat.

The event was led by Commissioner Mariya Gabriel.

On the 1st of December, in an atmosphere of great collaboration, the first meeting of the Working Group was held by videoconference. It coordinates the World Fair Play Day set on the 7th of September of each year. 

Present were the Club of Wallonie-Brussels, promoter of the event, the Head of the International Fair Play Committee, the President and Secretary of EFPM and for Panathlon International the General Secretary Simona Callo.

Several items on the agenda. From the coordination of the group, to the diffusion of the Manifesto from the management of the web site to the promotion campaign, from the celebration of the event in 2021 to the actions to be taken.

At the end of the meeting, the President of the Club of Wallonie Brussels, Philippe Housiaux thanked everyone for the team spirit shown and concluded by saying that " .... we all know that there is a lot of work to do, but we are already speaking the "language of fair play", the most precious of all the languages of the world (and not only in the world of sport)".

The second meeting has already been scheduled for January 2021 in order to update the progress of the work. 

District Uruguay – Videoconference on "The Tokyo Olympics (2020) 2021"

Thursday, November 26, 2020

"The Tokyo Olympics (2020) 2021".

Speaker will be the President of the Uruguayan Olympic Committee and Honorary Member of the International Olympic Committee, Dr. Julio Cesare Maglione.

International President Pierre Zappelli will attend the Conference.

Link in Zoom

Panathlon Club Lisbona -Sessione Novembre 

L'incontro si terrà Giovedì 19 novembre e sarà trasmesso attraverso il canale YouTube alle ore 20 (ora Portogallo)

District Peru – America gives recognition to the work accomplished by José Pilar Sánchez

Luis Moreno, newly elected International Board Member (2020-2023), convened a meeting via Zoom to give recognition to the work accomplished by José Pilar Sánchez Gonzales as International Board Member in the years 2016-2019.

A la cita asistieron, Jorge Minuto, presidente del Club de Buenos Aires, Pedro De Souza, presidente del Distrito Brasil, Bernardo Pavisic, del Club de Cochabamba – Bolivia, Eduardo Gurovich, presidente del Distrito Chile, Danilo Carrera, presidente del Distrito Ecuador, Socorro Samaniego, presidente del Distrito México, Víctor Castro, presidente del Distrito Perú, Edgardo Ettlin, presidente del Distrito Uruguay, y Carlos De León del Club de Maldonado – Punta del Este.

La parte anecdótica de la reunión se dio cuando Luis Moreno, mostraba desde Lima el plato recordatorio y ofrecía entregarlo en forma presencial en el Congreso Panamericano; a la misma vez, Socorro Samaniego, en México, entregaba a José Pilar una réplica fotográfica del mismo plato.

El homenaje fue muy emotivo y sirvió para acentuar la amistad entre los panatletas de América, recoger experiencias anteriores y comentar acerca del Congreso Panamericano, que -Dios mediante- se organiza para octubre del 2021; y que servirá para que tanto panatletas de Europa y América incrementen sus vínculos de amistad, siempre presentes en las reuniones del Panathlon Internacional.