African Beach Party

On April 6th, Prague's Duha humanist movement will attempt to bring the pulsating rhythms of an African beach party to the land-locked Czech Republic. But the Africa Beach Ball, to be held in the grand hall of the city's Lucerna complex, has a serious side, part of a campaign to raise money and awareness for development projects in Africa. Nicole Negowetti reports.

Dana Feminova is the spokeswoman for Duha: "There are many problems in African countries, and we want to organise the people to start to resolve these problems. It's a project to help in education, to help in healthcare, and also to help kids from poor families. Here in Prague we are organising a Beach Ball Africa; it's an event with music to support this campaign in Africa."

Ms Feminova says the Czech people are in a position to help those in need:

"There are also many people from Africa [living in Prague] and from them we can know about the problems they have in their countries. The humanist movement is an international organisation so we think that because we are in Europe and we have good conditions for life, we have also conditions to help others and to help people in African countries. This is the idea of the humanist movement: we are all human beings, and we can help each other."

But the beach party will not only be an opportunity to enjoy African music and dance, but also to celebrate diversity, promote tolerance and combat racism:

"This is exactly why we are doing this event here in the Czech Republic, the Beach Ball Africa, because it's very interesting for the people to know each other, to know different cultures, to know different music, to spend free time together. In this way we think we can go against discrimination, against racism, because if people know each other and can speak to others, they can under understand that we're all the same, and that there's no reason for discrimination."

And just a reminder that the Africa Beach Party takes place at the Grand Hall of Prague's Lucerna Palace on April 6th.