By: Rowaida Mahmoud
Social media users spoke last week about celebrating Mother’s Day; how a Brazilian court deciding to uphold an Italian court’s rape conviction for the former Milan and Brazil striker Robinho and the French Football Federation (FFF) setting up new rule that forcing Muslim players from fasting while training.
World marks Mother’s Day
On March 21, many countries celebrate Mother’s Day, coinciding with the beginning of spring.
Two brothers called Moustafa Amin and Ali Amin, the founders of Akhbar el-Youm Newspaper, came with the idea of Mother’s Day after a mother sent a message to Ali Amin told him that her daughters and sons deal her badly.
Accidentally, a mother visited Moustafa Amin on the same day, telling him that she didn’t marry after becoming a widow to raise her little children, and after they graduated and married, they infrequently visited her.
Consequently, Moustafa Amin wrote in his famous column ‘fekra’ (idea) a suggestion to set aside a day for mothers; Ali Amin and most of the readers supported the idea. They chose March 21 to celebrate mothers as a way of appreciation.
Egypt celebrated the first Mother’s Day on March 21, 1956.
Thanks to Anna Jarvis, In 1908, the United States celebrated Mother’s Day and announced it as an official holiday. Jarvis was very close to her mother.
Jarvis started the idea with a big campaign, including businessmen, ministries and congressmen.
On May 10, 1908, the Church in Grafton honoured her, and this was the beginning of Mother’s Day in America.
In 1911, all the united States celebrated the day, according to the American Congress that announced Mother’s Day officially on May 10.
International Day of Happiness
Every year on March 20, the world celebrates the International Day of Happiness. United Nations General Assembly set March 28 as an International Day of Happiness by a decision issued on July 12, 2012.
The world celebrated for the first time on March 20, 2013. The International Day of Happiness is the result of the United Nations adviser Jamie Lynn’s campaign.
Lynn said that he started to think about the day of happiness in 2011, pointing out the former secretary general, Ban Ki-Moon, supported his idea and agreed to insert the day in the calendar of organisation celebrations.
Ndaba Mandela, the grandson of Nelson Mandela, and Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of Bill Clinton, hold the first celebration. Starting from 2012, the United Nations issued a report to record the indicators of happiness in the world.
The report depends on 6 standards, which are one’s part of gross domestic product (GDP), one’s average age, free decision-making, spreading justice, the quality of educational and medical services, as well as absence of corruption.
The theme for 2024 International Day of Happiness is “Building a Happier World Together.”
Ex-Man City player Robinho to serve rape sentence in Brazil
A Brazilian court has decided to uphold an Italian court’s rape conviction for the former Milan and Brazil striker Robinho, and that the former star player must serve his nine-year prison sentence in Brazil, according to The Guardian.
The trial in Brazil’s superior court of justice (STJ), the country’s top court for non-constitutional matters, had a majority rule that Italy’s decision was valid in Brazil.
A Milan court in 2017 found Robinho and five other Brazilians guilty of gang raping a woman in 2013 after plying her with alcohol in a discotheque.
The conviction was confirmed by an appeals court in 2020 and validated by Italy’s supreme court in 2022.
The 40-year-old Robinho, whose full name is Robson de Souza, lives in Brazil and has always denied the charges.
Brazil does not usually extradite its citizens, so Italy requested last year that Robinho should serve his prison sentence in his home country.
Robinho’s attorney José Eduardo Alckmin said after the trial that Robinho would surrender to authorities when officially notified about the decision.
The Brazilian court did not reopen discussions about the rape conviction, focusing only on seeing if the sentence in Italy was valid in Brazil.
However, Robinho said in an interview broadcast that he hoped the court would look at the merit of the Italian case.
“I was unfairly convicted in Italy for something that did not occur,” he said.
France bans Ramadan fasting for Muslim players
The French Football Federation ( FFF) set up new rule that forcing Muslim players from fasting while training.
Players who observe Ramadan will not be able to fast while at the country’s Clairefontaine training base and will have to make up for the fasting days they miss at the end of the religious festival.
Due to this tough decision, midfielder Mahamadou Diawara left France’s under-19 squad.
Every French national team head coach, from U16 boss Lionel Rouxel to senior head coach Didier Deschamps, told their players at the start of the international break.
“Some players are not happy with this decision,” an agent representing a number of players in a number of France’s youth and senior sides told ESPN. “They believe that their religion is not respected and that they are not respected either. Some don’t want to cause a fuss but Mahamadou was not happy with it so he left.”
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