By Azara Lavia
It was undoubtedly one of the weekend’s most highly anticipated sporting events.
A football match with a difference saw two previously warring youth gangs put their feuding aside on the pitch.
The 2Drilly Gang and the recently-renamed Grays Farm Turf took to the field at the Antigua Barbuda Football Association (ABFA) Technical Centre for a friendly game to cement a truce. The match went without a hitch and resulted in a 7-5 win for 2Drilly.
The peace deal was brokered through the personal intervention of Prime Minister Gaston Browne. Browne, who attended and participated in the event, lauded its success.
“It’s remarkable to see such unity and peace here,” he said, observing the players. He emphasized the role of sports in reconciliation and in offering youth positive alternatives. “Programs like these are vital for keeping our young people on a constructive path and helping them build a peaceful future.”
Among those on the field was the Labour Party’s caretaker for St John’s Rural West, Michael Joseph.
Observer was there to capture the action and caught up with Joseph after the final whistle was blown.
“We started this journey about 15 days ago. Of course, everybody knows about the issue with the two warring groups and the violence. We brought them together and there was a lot of criticism against the administration, particularly the Prime Minister, but in his heart, he really felt that he needed them to understand that people care and that’s one of the things that we realized in the discussion. They just wanted to know that people are there. Many of them come from homes that they don’t hear they love you or get to feel like somebody, feel like someone is there for them, and that’s what we tried to demonstrate. So, this is a combination of those events the last two weeks, the hard work that we’ve put in.”
We’re happy to see that we had a successful match. People were worried. They were telling us not to do it. It’s going to end-up in violence. They gave us a commitment. They said, listen, the war is over. The violence is done. We’re going to show you, we’re going to show the people of Antigua and Barbuda. They came, they played. Of course, it was intense because everybody wanted to win, but as you can see, it was incident-free and that was the great success of this.”
The two gangs have been linked to a long spate of violent attacks among young people. Joseph encouraged the community to do more to implement diversionary activities for local youths.
