I got to Rio in ’97 and was working for a big Brazilian charity organisation, but it quickly became clear to me that we weren’t accessing the right kids. I’d boxed as an amateur previously (I was 1995 British universities light-middleweight champion) and I knew from that experience that the sport would be a good way of ensuring this access. I also knew that boxing can be an excellent platform for personal development – for enhancing discipline, confidence and self-respect.
The charity Fight for Peace was founded in 2000, and initially consisted of me and 10 youngsters. By last year, we’d grown to accommodate 1,800 kids at two academies in London and Brazil.
We operate in Rio’s Complexo da Maré neighbourhood, which consists of 17 different favelas that have been warring with each other since about ’95. Gun violence and drug gangs are a constant here, and the lack of social services has led to the use of children and adolescents as armed foot soldiers, lookouts and dealers. Just now, we’ve had to shut down one of our satellite projects temporarily because of trouble in the neighbourhood (we should have it up and running again next week). We offer social services as one of the five pillars of our organisation. The others are: boxing and martial arts training, supplementary education and personal development, coaching in the job market and youth leadership. As part of the last, the kids themselves help a lot with the day-to-day running of the organisation.
Fight for Peace was so named because for some people, peace isn’t a given, it isn’t a constant: every morning they have to get up and fight for it. Roberto Custódio is now the Brazilian national lightweight champion and our greatest success story, but when he joined the Fight for Peace boxing academy as a 13-year-old he’d just lost his dad through gun violence. Now he’s our embodiment, our campaign boy, and a face of the Brazilian Olympics. He’s coming over to London to attend our launches next week.
We’ve lost a lot of kids along the way, through and to gun violence. Though the press likes to make it look as though every kid is a potential gangster, however, that’s just not true. There are kids who are already going in the right direction, and there are also those we managed to turn around. They’ve all got what we at Fight for Peace call “real strength”. They’re amazing, inspirational young people who refuse to give in and get involved in the gangs. Lots of them are at university now, on their way to becoming teachers and lawyers having learned, through boxing, the confidence and self-respect necessary to progress. We have a saying: “World champion, life champion”. Our organisation has had success producing champions in the ring, but also in producing those with the ability to succeed in life.
Luta is a brand, however, not a charity. I liked the idea of founding a charity and then a business that gives 50% of its profits to that charity, so the charity itself becomes a sharer in the company’s success. This clothing and equipment range has grown out of Fight for Peace’s backstory, and out of 10 years of training and working with these kids. The spirit has been around for 10 years before we even started selling the clothes. But it isn’t technically part of Fight for Peace: it’s a well-designed, well-researched brand in its own right. The fightwear was designed in tandem with Central St Martins [College of Art and Design], and we interviewed hundreds of boxers along the way to help us produce some excellent equipment. It’s really technical stuff – that’s the point. This was never about “buy a T-shirt, help a kid”.
We’re not an Oxfam campaign – we’re not interested in that. This is why Luta had to stand alone. It’s a very cool, very well-thought-out sports and fightwear brand, which draws on the principles of “real strength” – what we see in these kids every day. It came about from the inspirational examples of these young heroes – that despite the adversity they face every day, they still get up and fight on.
As told to Peter Beech
• Luta is now available at Kings Road Sporting Club, London SW3.
Source: Read Full Article