A diverse team of staff members from IOM South Africa joined a throng of thousands of walkers and runners through Pretoria’s Centurion suburb for the annual Spar Women’s Challenge on Saturday 28th August 2011.

IOM used this event as a platform to promote the message “Ubuntu has no borders” to raise awareness for IOM’s counter xenophobia project aimed at building and strengthening communities of diversity and peace.

Dubbed South Africa’s Most Beautiful Race, this challenge takes place annually every August in honour of women from all walks of life and has a special focus on having fun and enjoying the company of other women.  You would be forgiven for thinking that this is an exclusive women’s only event, but thousands of men have historically participated (dressed up as women) in this challenge to show their support, and this year was no different.  This always adds a little bit of humour to the event.

More than 27 000 people turned up for the challenge and there were two categories to choose from, the 5km run/walk and the 10km run/ walk. The fastest IOM runner finished the 5km race in 30 minutes, while the rest of the staff members were only too happy to spend a fun day walking and enjoying what seemed to be a fine and sunny spring day.

“It was a great walk, the staff turned up in their numbers and the weather was perfect for the walk,” says Henriette van Niekerk, Senior HR and Admin Assistant at IOM South Africa. “We can’t wait for next year,” she adds.

IOM’s stall proved to be very popular and attracted many visitors who expressed interest in the counter xenophobia project and gave enthusiastic comments about the messaging.

This project is funded by the United States Department of State, Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration ( PRM) and European Commission in South Africa through United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).