February 26, 1997 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — Extensions of Remarks E327 PHILADELPHIA OLDTIMERS SOC- ADDRESS BY FRANCIS SEJERSTED solution to the twenty-year-old conflict in CER ASSOCIATION 50TH ANNI- East Timor. To reach this peaceful VERSARY winterland Norway, you have come about as HON. FRANK R. WOLF far from your home country as it is possible OF VIRGINIA to travel on this earth. Yet the distance be- IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES tween us is much shorter in miles than in op- HON. ROBERT A. BORSKI portunities for peace, justice and reconcili- Wednesday, February 26, 1997 ation. We are grateful and proud that, in the OF PENNSYLVANIA Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, last November, middle of your important and self-sacrificing IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Bishop Carlos Ximenes Belo and Dr. Jose work, you have found time for the journey Ramos-Horta were awarded the Nobel Peace here, thereby giving us this opportunity to Wednesday, February 26, 1997 honour you. Prize for their efforts in bringing peace to East The conflict in East Timor has been called Mr. BORSKI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to Timor. I had the opportunity to attend the ‘‘the forgotten conflict’’. It has not, however, commemorate the 50th anniversary of the ceremony in Oslo with my colleague, the gen- been completely forgotten, having figured on Philadelphia Oldtimers Soccer Association. I tleman from Ohio, TONY HALL, who nominated the international agenda, with varying de- Bishop Belo for the prize in 1994 and 1995. I grees of prominence, throughout those twen- would like to speak in honor of this group be- ty years. But it has so to speak never caught cause of their commitment to the community. then had the opportunity to visit Bishop Belo in East Timor in January. on. There have been so many other interests They have focused their love of a sport into an and regards to attend to, and East Timor is organization that makes a positive contribution As part of our bipartisan effort to recognize so small. Rarely has the cynicism of world to the youth of Philadelphia. the Nobel Prize winners today, I am submitting politics been more clearly demonstrated. for the RECORD the speech made by the chair- The numerous considerations of ‘‘Realpoli- Founded in 1947, the Philadelphia Oldtimers man of the Nobel Committee when he pre- tik’’ have enabled an exceptionally brutal Soccer Association [POSA] was a synthesis of sented the award. form of neocolonialism to take place. Of a managers, benefactors, and players. The ADDRESS BY FRANCIS SEJERSTED, CHAIRMAN population of between six and seven hundred founders original intent to give something back OF THE NORWEGIAN NOBEL COMMITTEE, ON thousand, nearly two hundred thousand have to young people participating in the sport has THE OCCASION OF THE AWARD OF THE NOBEL died as the direct or indirect result of the In- been upheld through POSA programs for 50 PEACE PRIZE FOR 1996 donesian occupation. And the violations are still taking place today. Many are the coun- years. POSA makes this contribution through Your Majesties, Presidents, Excellencies, tries which have given higher priority to ladies and gentlemen: On behalf of the Nor- many different means. their ‘‘Realpolitical’’ cooperation with Indo- wegian Nobel Committee, may I extend to nesia than to regard for East Timor. This is The National Soccer Hall of Fame included everyone a warm welcome to this year’s the apparently hopeless situation in which the Philadelphia Oldtimers Hall of Fame origi- Nobel Peace Prize ceremony. It is one hun- our two Laureates have so untiringly striven nal inductees as founding members in 1953. dred years to the day since Alfred Nobel for a just and peaceful arrangement for their There are now 16 members of POSA in the died. A year earlier, he had drawn up his people. National Hall of Fame. At an annual banquet, will, in which he determined that his consid- The autumn of 1975 was fateful for East POSA honors a male and female coach of the erable wealth should provide for annual Timor. First the old colonial masters, the year, a referee of the year, a manager of the awards of five prizes, three for science, one Portuguese, withdrew. Then an internal year, male and female player of the year, and for literature, and one for peace, to those struggle broke out between the Timorese whose work, as he wrote, ‘‘shall have con- a club of the year. Democratic Union on the one hand and the ferred the greatest benefit on mankind’’. It Fretilin liberation movement on the other. POSA annually selects an all-scholastic was also laid down in the will that the Peace And the autumn ended with the Indonesian team. The Philadelphia Catholic, Philadelphia Prize should be awarded in Norway by a com- invasion. In the twenty-one years that have Public, Inter-Academic, and Suburban One mittee appointed by the Norwegian storting. passed since, this conquest of a country and Leagues individually submit candidates for the Our thoughts today go also to Stockholm, a people has never been internationally where the other awards are being made, and recognised. Ramos-Horta was a Fretilin lead- POSA team. The final 22 players and 4 alter- where the centenary is being marked of the nates are selected through a tryout process er, one of the moderates whose ideal was so- death of Alfred Nobel. cial democracy. During the so-called civil from a pool of about 90 players. This final Nobel was, of course, an unusually success- war, he was out of the country, and on his re- team goes on to play teams from Lehigh Val- ful businessman. But that was not where his turn in September he tried to reconcile the ley, western suburban Philadelphia, Staten Is- heart lay. His happiest times were spent in parties. Since the invasion he has lived land, Cape May, and other prominent local the laboratory. Inventions, it has been said, abroad, unceasingly and with great personal clubs. became for him a way of life. He was also sacrifice collecting and communicating in- very widely read. He was in other words formation on the repression, torture and Helping the players receive college scholar- greatly interested, indeed a believer, in killing in his home country, and acting as ship funding is one of the oldtimers fundamen- science and literature. What was remarkable East Timor’s principal international spokes- tal goals, and the all-scholastic team provides was his moral approach to those activities, man. At the same time he has successfully a medium through which college coaches can which he saw as opportunities for promoting kept up his efforts to unite the various East assess and recruit POSA players. Many mem- a better world. This perspective emerges Timorese groups in a single national front, bers of the team have received scholarships, most clearly in his decision concerning a while constantly seeking opportunities for a peace prize. It can be argued that the inven- with some continuing on to play professional peaceful solution to the conflict with Indo- tion of dynamite, and concern at the more nesia, based on respect for the integrity of soccer. powerful weapons which it made possible, the East Timorese people. ‘‘We used to joke POSA has recently added a new focus to its contributed to his increasing commitment to that he was more an informal member of the effortsÐthe development of a girls program. peace. But there were other impulses, too, Democratic Union than a Fretilin leader,’’ They are committed to offering the same op- impulses which appealed to his deeply rooted says Union leader Joa˜ o Carrascala˜ o. The re- moral instincts, first and foremost his con- mark illustrates the part played by Ramos- portunity to girls that the boys all-scholastic tact with the future Peace Prize Laureate Horta as a mediator and conciliator. No seri- team has provided to its players in the past. Bertha von Suttner and with the contem- ous negotiations aimed at resolving the con- POSA's move to provide female soccer play- porary peace movement. flict are conceivable today without the par- ers with the same springboard to college soc- Nobel left an important inheritance, con- ticipation of Ramos-Horta or one of his cer is a step in a positive direction for female sisting of a vision of a better world, and an aides, as Bishop Belo has also emphasized. athletes in the Philadelphia area. award institution which was to contribute to As a relatively unknown priest, Bishop the realization of that vision. We who have Belo was appointed Apostolic Administrator When the POSA teams put their best foot been entrusted with managing that inherit- for the Roman Catholic church in East forward, they are also representing the best of ance do so in humility and with deep respect Timor in 1983, since when he has served on Philadelphia. Not only are they building a rep- for the man Alfred Nobel, whose memory we his home ground. Again and again, in the utation of great soccer and teamwork for honour today. midst of everyday terror and suffering, he themselves, they are contributing to the rep- It is with great pleasure, and in the convic- has intervened, trying to reconcile and medi- utation and success of Philadelphia's student tion that with this year’s choice we have ate and lessen confrontation, and in doing so managed Nobel’s inheritance in the best pos- he has saved many lives. Intervening in a athletes. On their 50th anniversary I would like sible way, that we welcome our Peace Prize violent conflict entails a risk of being to congratulate the Philadelphia Oldtimers Laureates today. Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo crushed between the antagonists. ‘‘Pray for Soccer Association and its players on their and Jose´ Ramos-Horta have been awarded me, please,’’ he said in one such situation, achievements, and wish them future success the Nobel Peace Prize for 1996 for their long- ‘‘because now I have to defend myself on in the sport of soccer and beyond. lasting efforts to achieve a just and peaceful both sides’’. But Bishop Belo has become