The “From Noruz to Akito” campaign, which took place with the support of Center for Civil Society and Democracy (CCSD), aimed to promote the value of co-existence through public media. Adder Press covered the campaign in Qamishlo on its website.
CCSD volunteers hoped to spread messages of co-existence, dialogue, and acceptance. through billboards emblazoned with the phrases:
“We may not resemble each other, but we are more beautiful together.”
“We are all part of the whole.”
“I do not see my face, you do.”
The campaign idea behind the campaign was to call upon people’s shared humanity through statements worded in simple ways,, but deep in meaning.
The public outreach measures consisted of hanging seven billboards of various sizes in different locations around Qamishlo city, such as Osman Sabri Square, Al-Shabab City Intersection, Al-wehda Street/ Al-Salam Hospital, Old Municipal Intersection, Qamishlo Entrance Antera Rotor, and Semonedes Al-Kowatli Junction- Airport Junction.
The team in charge of the project used three languages (Kurdish, Arabic, Syriac) to write the messages in a way that expressed all ethnicities of the area known as the “Syrian Island”. This tri-lingual effort sought to enhance co-existence by defining the interlaced and common values of the culture shared by all people in the area.
The billboards were emblazoned with various phrases, such as, “We may not resemble each other, but we are more beautiful together”, “We are all part of a whole”, “I do not see my face, you do”, “Let’s draw what we love on walls separating us”, “Let’s make the history a tool to build the future”, “Help me to understand you”, and “Dialogue is the window to accept others”.
In addition to the billboards, a free guidebook was distributed to people of the area regarding different events and civil organizations.
The campaign will continue to work on deploying messages of co-existence through four radio series broadcasted by local stations.
Abbas Mousa, a member of CCSD declared in his discussion with Adder Press that “The purpose of the campaign is to spread clear ideas and messages to all components of the region, concentrating on the recognition that there is someone else rather than me, a partner for me, and I should realize that”.
Mosa added
“We seek to deploy many ideas like most conflict forms are due to a problem in the past, but we should make our inability to live with each other a lesson to coexist and build a beautiful future. Realizing that the problem must be resolved by the participation, helping, understanding each other and defining the word dialogue, its advantages and purposes”
It should be noted that this media campaign was supported by CCSD within Aman Network, a Syrian Network working on deploying values of peace, freedom, humanity, credibility, acceptance, and conflict resolution and avoidance in the different Syrian regions.
Editor: F. Edwar/ Adder Press