9 April 2009
Zahra and Gill were invited to the Banqueting Room at Whitehall.
FAN meetings have been cited as an example of good practice in integrating people into the community by the Advisory Board for Naturalisation and Integration - in their Final Report which came out in 2008.
Zahra was asked to speak about the "Road to British Citizenship". Gill said Zahra's many friends in FAN Meetings would have been very proud of her. She spoke so well. Zahra also told the listeners how marvellous it was to find her first FAN meeting which was in Severn Road FAN Group in Canton, Cardiff.
After that she went to different FAN Groups regularly and made many friends. Zahra said she was very lonely in her first couple of years in this country and she felt very shy and not confident. Then she said "You can see how much confidence I have had from the FAN Meetings, that is why I can stand here and talk to you today."
Lots of people came up to her afterwards to tell her how moved they were by her speech.
If you would like to read the ABNI Report, please click HERE - The FAN Groups are featured on page 22.