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Newsletter from the Chairman January 2010
Dear Member
The Board of Mandela Center Denmark hereby wishes you and yours a Happy New Year and we thank you for your support for 2009
In April 2009 Vice Chairman Hardy Hansen resigned and Rikke Forchhammer stepped into his place. Mandela Center’s cashier Kaj Olsen and two other members of the board resigned as well. New members have joined and together we have worked towards the realization of our joint dream – to establish a centre that commemorates the thoughts and life of one of the greatest living statesmen, Nelson Mandela, and his shining example of creating peace and reconciliation between people.
The past year has been influenced by the Boards many activities which has been participation in other organization’s activities that we have been invited to. Amongst our own activities the Board have held several lectures; we have had meetings with a project developing consultant as well as hosting our 4 annual brunch meetings at the PH Café.
The Chairman has travelled to South Africa and visited several possible partners. Amongst those were both institutions as Nelson Mandela Foundation, the South African Historical Archives, Robben Island’s Former Prisoners Forum, several NGOs and larger Danish businesses operating in South Africa.
We have established a fundraising task force whose goal is to seek funds for our Center solution and other activities.
We have also created a Vision and Project development Task Force, a Rules and Regulations Group and finally we have worked towards getting our materials updated to an English version of Mandela Center Denmarks’s pamphlet and updating our website www.mandelacenter.dk to reflect the many enquiries we receive and meetings we have held.
Mandela Center Denmark has many plans for the new working year – negotiations with other organizations to establish a centre and place for activities where Mandela Center Denmark can also reside, to employ a Project Manager and also to arrange and host 4 Brunch Meetings in 2010 with people who has been sent out from Denmark to participate in reconciliation work and democracy development around the world. Furthermore we plan to create the so called Mandela Lectures in cooperation with the university.
We will be pleased to tell you all about this, and more at our next General Assembly on April 19th at the PH Café which you will receive further information about.
Through the year we have build up credibility and received sponsor support for our different meetings and activities which we are truly grateful for and would like to take this opportunity to say thank you.
We continue to work with great pleasure and strength to realize the goal of establishing a physical centre and we need all your support to do so - both through your yearly membership dues, active participation in the activities of the new year as well as getting new members to enroll in Mandela Center Denmark.
Together we have a dream of a more peaceful world in 2010 - and it starts right here with you and me.
Happy New Year and see you all in 2010.
Best regards
Helle Degn
Chairman of Mandela Center Denmark.
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