IGLFA - News

10/11/2011

Months after the Japanese national team have returned home with its first FIFA Women's World Cup title, the governing body of international soccer announced that it will investigate homophobia in the sport.

According to activist organization AllOut.org, which together with the IGLFA and FGG began a campaign to condemn homophobia in women's soccer, FIFA's secretary general Jérôme Valcke announced an investigation against Nigerian Football coach Eucharia Uche.

Source: ADVOCATE.COM

Even before the Women's World Cup kicks off this Sunday, June 26, the rules have already been broken.

For the past two years the Nigerian Football Federation has conducted a witch-hunt to kick women off the national team who were suspected of being gay. And the team's coach just bragged to the New York Times that she has dealt with “the big problem” of lesbianism.

FIFA, soccer’s world governing body, has a powerful record of fighting discrimination. Now as Nigeria takes the field in the Women's World Cup opening game,FIFA needs to give coach Uche the red card: publicly condemn systematic discrimination and take the necessary steps to end homophobia in the league.

FGG and the IGLFA do support this petition. Please sign in at http://www.allout.org/fifa/

House of Delegates Meeting 2011

Dear IGLFA Member:

Pursuant to an electronic vote conducted by the IGLFA, the previously announced IGLFA House of Delegates meeting scheduled for the 10th June 2011 in Manchester, England will be postponed until the 3rd June 2012 in Mexico City, Mexico.

The IGLFA Board sought the approval of the current general members of the Association to postpone the Annual General Meeting in Manchester until the World Championship 2012 in Mexico City, Mexico. Twenty-one clubs approved this move. No clubs voted in the dissent.

Under the terms of the constitution, the Officers of the Board serve two year terms, but can serve in office for two consecutive terms or until their successors are elected. The existing Board will remain in office until the next World Championship in 2012. At the 2012 Championship, a new Board will be elected.

The IGLFA Board will still hold informational meetings at both the Manchester and Vancouver tournaments for the Board to share news, updates, etc. with the IGLFA member clubs.

Thank you very much for responding to the previous request, and for your patience and understanding.

The Board

A Special Thank You to all of our Supporters and Previous Board Members:

On behalf of the IGLFA Board of Directors, we would like to take this opportunity to express our sincere appreciation to previous board members, current and previous member organizations and individual supporters of the IGLFA community. Your acts of service and volunteerism have been extremely generous.

Overall, we appreciate your dedication and hard work. These efforts have helped this organization achieve success and have allowed IGLFA the opportunity to reach new communities. Each time, these local populations or cities have embraced, encouraged and demanded respect for gay athletes.

Thanks to those efforts these initiatives have helped pave a new way for the IGLFA. Hopefully, we will be able to continue those rich traditions, encourage new partnerships and develop innovative tournaments to better serve our members and the global gay community.

Once again, thank you for your service. We hope you will continue to support IGLFA efforts and all of our endeavors across the world.

Sincerely,

IGLFA Board of Directors

Versión Español Deutsche Version

IGLFA supports the Justin Fashanu Campaign against Homophobia in football

All information about this campaign can be found at: http://www.thejustincampaign.com

16th Come-Together-Cup Cologne

Play football against each other, talk to each other and celebrate together: Since 1995, a colourful starting field of 50 teams has met annually on the “Cologne Jahnwiese” to compete for the Come-Together-Cup (CTC), a football festival held to support the integration of minorities and against homophobia and discrimination. The proceeds from this honorary event are used to benefit social community projects and, since 2005, to support the RUBICON Advice Centre and the “anyway” Youth Centre.

Joining the party are ambitious recreational athletes from social fringe groups as well as football enthusiasts from the media, culture, commerce and industry. The teams compete for the CTC Challenge Cup in two parallel tournaments for men and women.

A diverse entertainment programme with appearances by local artists provides for amusement around the fringes of the playing area. The traditional VIP Fun Game is a real crowd-puller. Thus, the combination of sport, entertainment and getting together has become an event for which the CTC Organisation Team has coined the unifying motto, "Gemeinsamer geht's nicht!" (“Togetherness doesn’t get any closer!”)

CTC founder Andreas Stiene commented, “As a gay-lesbian initiative, we want to intentionally reach out to other social groups and make them a concrete ‘get to know us offer’ via the number one popular sport.”

With attendance numbers of up to 20,000 spectators, this has been quite successful. In recent years, the Cologne example has set a precedent since meanwhile Come-Together-Cups have also been established in Essen (from 2006 to 2008) and Berlin (since 2005).

The CTC is under the patronage from Jürgen Roters (Mayor of Cologne).

Warmest regards from Cologne

Andreas Stiene

-Founder of CTC-

ctc@netcologne.de