du and KidZania work together to create a special day for Thalassemic kids

Press release

Published June 14th, 2011 - 10:39 GMT

Children celebrating the open day

Following its recent success with the blood donation campaign “Drop of Life” in which 268 donors from du participated to support the Thalassemia Centre, du extended its hand one more time and organised a fun-filled ‘Open Day’ for the children of the centre along with their parents, at the children’s edutainment centre, KidZania, in The Dubai Mall.

During the fun-filled ‘Open Day’, kids and their parents were presented a unique dual offering of entertainment and education. Employees of du played a major role; actively participating in making the day a success and putting a smile on the faces of all the young patients.

As part of the activities, the children were divided into groups and each group was led by a du senior employee, who took each of their groups on a enjoyable tour around the city of KidZania, and also took time to put together small educational sketches – to help educate these kids on the principles of life in today’s modern society, which in turn will help them face the future as they grow.

Hala Badri, Executive Vice President, Brand and Communications, du; Ahmad Aburahima, Vice President, Government Relations; Luma Jasim, Vice President Corporate Communications; and Nahla Al Fadhlani, Senior Manager, National Associates Programme participated in the event.

“It was a day of excitement and entertainment for these children and their parents, who praised the initiative and expressed their happiness at seeing their kids interacting and enjoying themselves at KidZania,” said Hala Badri, Executive Vice President, Brand and Communications, du.

du supports various initiatives – which has helped to improve the lives of the local community – through key corporate responsibility programmes and supporting NGOs, and also by working directly with the community.

“This initiative underlines our commitment to Corporate Social Responsibility efforts, which will benefit all the community divisions, including children with Thalassemia. The KidZania ‘Open Day’ has brought a great deal of joy to the lives of children and inevitably to their parents as well,” Badri concluded.

Background Information

Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (du)

Ever since we opened for business in 2006, we have worked hard to enhance and expand our bouquet of services in an industry that is at the heart of economic and social transformation. Bringing people and businesses together is what we do best, offering mobile and fixed telephony, broadband connectivity and IPTV services to people, homes and businesses all over the UAE. We also provide carrier services, a data hub, internet exchange facilities and satellite services for broadcasters.

Company Profile

Emaar Retail

Emaar Retail is the entertainment and retail subsidiary of Emaar Malls Group. Emaar Retail drives the mall developments of Emaar in key emerging markets, such as Middle East and North Africa, by offering innovative and unique entertainment and retail experiences that are structured to individual market preferences.

Emaar Retail develops and manages a portfolio of brands in its growth markets and is strategically building new alliances, joint ventures and franchises for all mall developments under Emaar Malls Group. Emaar Retail manages the entertainment, leisure and retail operations of global leading brands such as Dubai Aquarium & Underwater Zoo, Dubai Ice Rink, KidZania, SEGA Republic, Reel Cinemas and ARMANI/CASA, amongst others - at The Dubai Mall, the world’s largest shopping destination; as well as Reel Cinemas at Dubai Marina Mall.