Associations important for integration

– We parents started Skåne’s Horn of Africa. It was cheaper for the association to rent Indoor arenas for our youngsters when they wanted to do some extra training .It costs twice as much for a private person, says Jamal Abdulle. He has been, and is, involved in a number of associations, both in Sweden and in other countries.

– The sector based on ideas is something we need to have to improve integration, why do so few people at Gamlegården go and vote? Most people don’t think it has anything to do with them , he says.

He has gradually learnt more about how an association is organised. There must be a committee, they learn how a meeting should be conducted, and how to write the minutes of a meeting.

Kultur- och fritidsförvaltningen (Committee for Culture and Leisure) have been a great help. There anyone who wants to start an association can find out how to do so.

The Skåne’s Horn of Africa association has about 200 members, of whom most are children. The association arranges football tournaments, gives help with homework and has driven projects to change attitudes towards harmful traditions/female genital mutilation and ADA (an anti-discrimination project), and more.

How can we get people who live at Gamlegården to take a more active part in things?

– It’s a matter of making parents more conscious of the importance for their children of being involved, especially in different kinds of sport, and of getting help with homework. All parents want their children to be successful. But the information doesn’t get through, there’s a gap. Somehow or other we don’t seem to be able to make them understand how important it is, both for their children’s sake and for their own.