INTERNATIONAL SUFI SCHOOL IN LATIN AMERICA
SANTIAGO DEL ESTERO: THE SCHOOL’S GATEWAY TO ARGENTINA AND LATION AMERICA
The Head of the International Sufi School, Sheikh Aly N’Daw, accompanied by other members of the School, visited Argentina from the 24th to the 29th of June 2008.
The delegation first visited Santiago del Estero, the first province founded in Argentina by the Conquistadores. The province celebrates its 455th anniversary this year. During our visit, preparations were ongoing in Santiago del Estero for important celebrations in the month of July.
During the one-day visit to Santiago del Estero, members of the International Sufi School (ISS) had the opportunity of meeting with teachers, students and the media. Thanks to Maria del Carmen Naverette, History teacher at El Centro Educativo de Nivel Secundario de Jóvenes y Adultos Nº1’, Sheikh Aly N’Daw had the opportunity of addressing his message of peace and love to the students and teachers. He explained that everyone is a potential peacemaker, if one chooses an ideal of peace and is committed to Being peace. A Peace Education programme is being prepared by the International Sufi School for its future visits to Santiago del Estero.
Karina Villalba, director of a radio station in Santiago del Estero, Abdu Salam Aidara, friend of Sheikh Aly N’Daw and Maria del Carmen Navarette also organised for the delegation to meet the media at the Library of Santiago del Estero. We also had the opportunity of meeting journalists of El Liberal who published an article on The International Sufi School and its leader. (See “El líder mundial del sufismo busca traer paz a escuelas santiagueñas”
On Thursday 26th of June, the ISS delegation had the privilege of meeting the Argentinean Nobel Peace Prize Winner 1980, Mr Adolfo Perez Esquivel. The delegation presented the research that the School has conducted on peacemakers together with an overview of ongoing alternative economic projects in the peace village of Pout in Senegal. The aim of the visit was mainly to establish contact and to seek his permission to conduct research on his life as a peacemaker, according to the 12 steps of the Initiatory Way to Peace. The School is now working towards this new publication in the series on peacemakers, entitled, Peace: The Universal Religion.
Mr Esquivel has invited the members of the School to visit his current projects for the youth of Argentina. Sheikh Aly N’Daw has personally invited Adolfo Perez Esquivel to the School’s International Conference on Economy by means of Peace to be held in Dakar in 2012.
The School salutes the determination of the Argentinean people who have organized themselves in a short time to carry on the peace work initiated by the International Sufi School in Santiago del Estero. The School also has adherents from Buenos Aires. From Santiago del Estero, the International Sufi School plans to visit other provinces and neighbouring countries.