Ahlul Bayt News Agency (ABNA.ir), Manila -- The prestigious French Legion of Honor and National Order of Merit Association have re-elected as co-presidents French Ambassador Thierry Borja de Mozota and former Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr., who announced completion of the rebuilding of the first Muslim mosque built in Tawi-Tawi.
In their announcement, De Mozota and De Venecia said the association’s “modest Mosque project symbolizes Christian-Muslim solidarity in a strategic isle of the Sulu Sea where Islam began” in the Philippines.
The mosque was first built in 1380 or 141 years before the arrival in the Philippines of the first Spanish colonizers led by Ferdinand Magellan.
The French Ambassador and De Venecia, together with re-elected officers, Vice President Louis-Paul Heussaff, and Philippine Gautheir, Deputy Secretary-General Grace Glory Go, Treasurer Roberto de Ocampo, Deputy Treasurer Aurelio Montinola III, and Legal Counsel Noel Laman, Corporate Secretary George-Gascon Feydean, and Special Assistant Gretchen Willwayco are recipients of the French Legion of Honor and Order of Merit, the highest awards of the French government, initiated by the Emperor Napoleon.
The Association designated Heussaff, French business leader, to coordinate the Mosque’s rehabilitation with the National Historical Institute headed by Ludovico Badoy, the Makdum Mosque Foundation under its president M.A. Bayo, Tawi-Tawi Gov. Sadikul Sahali and Rep. Nur Juafar and other leaders of the Muslim civil society following their multi-sector meeting in Manila early this year.
The project was initiated by Heussaff and by former De Venecia who introduced the Interfaith and Christian-Muslim dialogue that was approved by the United Nations in 2004.
The simple but historic project started last year by the French Legion of Honor Association through then French Ambassador to the Philippines Gerard Chesnel, is now succeeded by De Mozota, and by De Venecia.
De Venecia said the global Christian-Muslim and Interfaith dialogue became a feature of the foreign policy of most nations to reduce the politico-religious tensions and conflicts in various parts of the world and to help ward-off the so-called “clash of civilizations.”
The association that was founded in 2007, held its Board Meeting and General Assembly, and hosted by Ambassador Thierry Borja de Mozota at his Makati residence.
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