Tennis star Angie to promote worldwide anti-tobacco drive
Musthofid, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Indonesian tennis starlet Angelique Widjaja, also a WHO (World Health Organization) health promotion spokesperson, would go to New Delhi, India for a worldwide anti-tobacco campaign, a WHO representative to Indonesia said here on Tuesday.
"Angelique is the perfect model for promoting a healthy lifestyle among young people. It is a great opportunity for WHO to cooperate with a young athlete like Angelique," Dr. Georg Petersen told a press conference at the organization's office in Central Jakarta.
Angie, as the 17-year-old Indonesian is nicknamed, has just returned from the Australian Open where she teamed up with Gisella Dulko from Argentina to win the junior girls doubles title.
The New Delhi trip is scheduled for later this month after her participation in the Qatar Finaelf Open and the Dubai Women's Open starting on Feb. 10.
Susan Loo, a WHO officer in charge of the Health Promotion & Tobacco Free Initiative, said that the New Delhi campaign would follow a national campaign to be immediately launched.
"We are going to run the campaign on seven local television stations," she said.
Angie will extend her WHO campaigning role to New Delhi where she is scheduled to be shot for a video clip advertisement along with Mohammad Kalen of the Maldives and Rofhan Mahanama of Sri Lanka.
"I'm proud that I can help WHO promote their anti-smoking message to people. As far as the athletic community is concerned I must say that athletes need physical strength and smoking is undoubtedly not good for them," Angie said.
Angie was inaugurated by WHO as the Health Champion last year, a first for an Indonesian athlete. Fellow tennis star Martina Hingis from Switzerland held the title as well.
Petersen said that Angie was not paid for her participation, calling the partnership "community involvement", based truly on a "volunteer spirit".
WHO's World No Tobacco Day campaign, which was launched last November, has been hailed worldwide and gained momentum when the 2002 Winter Olympics and FIFA World Cup organizers pledged to declare both events tobacco-free.
The Winter Games will open on Friday in Salt Lake City, in the U.S. and the 2002 World Cup will start in May in Japan and South Korea.
Angelique is currently ranked 147th in the world in singles, a meteorite-like improvement from around 500 just a few months ago. The highlight of her early career was winning the junior girls singles event at the 2001 Wimbledon Championships.
She followed up that feat with a victory at a senior tournament -- the Sanex Wismilak International in Bali last year -- which also included world-class senior players such as Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario of Spain.