Reunion’s disabled sport technical adviser, Annick Amacouty Sidat, leads a training course on the possibility of designing on site the equipment necessary for the practice of disabled sport.
In cooperation with the French Embassy in Madagascar, the Ministry of Youth and Sports and Madagascar Paralympic Committee (MPC), a five-day training course bringing together twenty-one trainees from all over the country, three foreigners from Mauritius, Mayotte and Comoros, share experiences at ANS Ampefiloha since Monday and until Sunday. Funded by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, this project, designed in early 2023 for a period of one year, has three objectives: to strengthen the structure of the Malagasy Paralympic Federation, to promote the emergence of an entrepreneurial sector for the production of disability sport and raise public awareness about disability through sport. Annick Amacouty Sidat, technical adviser for disabled people in Reunion, who leads the training, explained that “the course covers the facilitator, training, rules, qualification and practice. The French Embassy has done everything to ensure that all clubs affiliated with the Malagasy Paralympic Federation can benefit from the necessary advantages for the target persons. The objective is to ensure that people can build on the spot the materials necessary in the practice of disabled sport “
Chance of medals
For Mahasolo Tsivoa Morel, president of the Madagascar Paralympic Committee (MPC), this training course comes at the right time, two months before the 11th edition of the JIOI in 2023. “Twelve leagues are represented. The training focuses on the classification and qualification of people with disabilities according to the degree. Madagascar has a real chance of medals at the JIOI because our athletes have already achieved great performances. They have shown their talents outside and they are ready to defend the Malagasy colors at the 2023 JIOI. The Federation is also there so that the principle of inclusiveness applies to its members, without discrimination”. During the training sessions organized in Tana, the teams from Madagascar and Reunion will take stock of the different practicable disciplines depending on the pathologies, paying particular attention to their regulations, the precautions to be taken, the equipment to be adapted or used. . The purpose of the training is to allow a structured collective reflection on the question of the material to be produced. The objective is not to buy disabled sports equipment abroad but to contribute to strengthening the equipment design sector on site, in Madagascar, with the materials available.