Football or soccer is the most played sport around the world, and among the simplest to equip. FIFA created an international program to engage homeless and populations displaced by war, natural disasters and poverty in what they call “Homeless Football” that even has an international Homeless World Cup. In 2008, the Philippine Football Federation created a sports and education project in the heart of conflict-torn Mindanao called Football for Peace and Hope. Following a violent breakdown of a political peace process some 500,000 civilians fled their homes. AAI found that refugee children suffering from intensive nightmares and fears of going back to their home villages. Many had no homes to return to.

AAI’s leaders Albert Santoli and Rohaniza Sumndad began integrating trauma counseling and healing programs involving music, arts, games and sports. This led to a meeting with Mr. Mari Martinez , President of the Philippine Football Federation. PFF had begun a training center in the agricultural community of Bukidnon to be the center for a Football for Peace program in Mindanao. In nearby Marawi City there remained 30,000 displaced persons -- more than half being children -- temporarily sheltered in blue plastic rows of tents. When AAI began assisting the refugees in Marawi, Mr. Santoli remembered the FIFA Homeless Soccer program. This concept was strongly supported by local community leaders. In a sweltering blue plastic shelter, a blind grandmother held the hands of Ms. Sumndad and Mr. Santoli and asked that the world not forget her destitute family and their neighbors who felt invisible.

In discussing the refugees’ plight with Mr. Martinez, there was no question that the refugee children of Marawi could reestablish their connection to the world as part of the FIFA-inspired Philippine Football Federation Soccer for Peace program. In April 2009, Mr. Santoli and Ms. Sumndad, determined to keep their promise to the grandmother, were accompanied by trainers from the PFF to connect the invisible refugee community to the world as part of a Homeless Soccer athletic program.