Robert Bailey, Freelance Writer

Police constable Christopher Charley (right) raises the Special Olympics flag while members of the Special Olympics team look on at the flag-raising ceremony to mark the countdown of 100 days to the 2007 World Summer Games in Shanghai, China. The ceremony took place at Twin Gates Plaza yesterday morning. - Junior Dowie/Staff Photographer

With only 100 days to go before the start of this year's World Summer Games, the Special Olympics Association of Jamaica (SOJ) has kicked off their fund-raising campaign with a flag-raising ceremony, which was held at Twin Gates Plaza yesterday.

Jamaica will be sending a 71-member team to this year's tournament, which will be held in Shanghai, China, from October 2 to 7. The team includes 55 athletes, 14 coaches and two officials.

Telecommunications giants Digicel continued their support to the SOJ with a $2m donation that will go towards covering ad-ministrative expenses.

Eastwood Limited also presented a cheque of $100,000 towards the SOJ's office expenses.

Lorna Bell, executive director of the SOJ, called on Jamaica to come out and support the Special Olympians who captured a total of 49 medals in the last championships in Dublin, Ireland, in 2003, and added that they are well prepared.

"The team is well repared because they have been training every Saturday and they will continue to train every Saturday until their departure for China," said Bell.

Properly prepared

"They also have a camp coming in August at the University of the West Indies (UWI) and also the final camp will be in September," she said.

Bell added: "I am expecting our team to do extremely well because they are properly prepared. The coaches have been working extremely hard, especially with the football team, and I am also looking at the aquatics (swimmers) to do extremely well in China."

Also in attendance at yesterday ceremony was United Nations International Children's Education Fund (UNICEF) representative to Jamaica, Bertrand Bainvel.

He told The Gleaner after the ceremony that he was pleased with the efforts that Jamaica have been making regarding the rights of persons living with disabilities.

"Jamaica is the first country in the world that has ratified the UN Convention with people living with disabilities, so it's a great achievement for Jamaica, because Jamaica is leading the world in that issue," said Bainvel.

"We are here today (Monday) because we are developing a partnership globally with Special Olympics. We take this as a great opportunity because today we mark the 100 days before Shanghai. So we see it as a great opportunity to launch our public education campaign."