THE Fiji Association of Sport and National Olympic Committee, FASANOC as commonly known, was established in 1949 with its primary purpose being the development, promotion and protection of the Olympic Movement in Fiji.
Today (yesterday), 23 June has great significance for FASANOC and the Olympic Movement throughout the world as the Olympic Day and this year marks the 126th anniversary of the creation of the International Olympic Committee by our founder Pierre de Coubertin in 1894.
The prevailing spirit of Pierre de Coubertin’s time was dominated by aggressive nationalism and imperialism and which may have ignited the creative force to his idea and vision of the Olympic Games as a way to bring together all people of the world in peaceful competition.
On Olympic Day we also take the opportunity to look at the contribution of sport to global social issues that affect our communities, such as education, health promotion, HIV prevention, women’s and girls’ empowerment, environmental protection and peace building. FASANOC in its role as a National Olympic Committee has a dedicated outreach and education program under the Voices of the Athletes banner (VOA), using sport as a vehicle to achieve social development outcomes through its message of combating non- communicable diseases (NCD) and HIV captioned “stay healthy; “keeping our environment clean through its messages of “Go Green”.
FASANOC is also promoting and encouraging clean sport and the spirit of good sportmanship through the VOA’s messages captioned “Play True” as well as the VOA’s powerful message which emphasises the importance of individual effort in nurturing and developing actions and attitudes of a good leader in its messages of “Be a leader” using athletes from the different sports and communities as champions to bring these messages to the youth and children in the local communities and schools in our effort to use sport as a vehicle in nurturing social values for a better human being, better families, better communities and a better Fiji. Today on Olympic Day we celebrate “building a better world through sport”.
