04 February 2010
Egyptian-American Businessman Promotes Peace and Understanding
Kais Menoufy builds bridges for change
Washington — Kais Menoufy is a busy man. One of the most valuable players on Egypt’s national basketball team in the late 1960s, the California resident has come a long way from home. Menoufy is now the chief executive and president of Sacramento-based Delegata Corporation, an award-winning management and technology consulting firm. And this year, Menoufy has taken Delegata operations international with projects in Europe and the Middle East.
Before founding Delegata, Menoufy had a record of corporate success. As the managing director of Indus Companies and its head of international operations and strategic relations, Menoufy was instrumental in a tenfold increase in the company’s operations from $20 million to $200 million.
Menoufy’s savvy in the business world is well documented. But for some who know him, it is his position as a community activist that makes him truly special.
“When you have a visionary, they can plant seeds that inspire others. That’s what Kais did,” Marielle Tsukamoto, president of the Florin, California, chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), told America.gov about Menoufy’s community work.
Menoufy’s role as something more than a businessman started with an event that changed his life, and the lives of many others: the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Days after September 11, Menoufy attended a press conference by the local JACL where the group made a public appeal against targeting Muslims.
“After 9/11, I started to see a need and responsibility as an American Muslim born in Egypt to build bridges and help Americans understand [the Arab culture],” Menoufy told America.gov of the press conference’s impact on him. As a sign of appreciation for his community activism, Menoufy was recently honored by the JACL.
Spurred to action by the September 11 attacks, Menoufy now leads his community to create understanding between cultures often portrayed as at odds in the media. “I felt that so much coming through the media [about Muslims] is not true — so who is going to correct that? It has to be us.”
Much of Menoufy’s character and determination for achievement stems from his youth. After the death of his father, who was an Egyptian undersecretary of education, author and poet, Menoufy said he spent years living in his shadow. This changed when he was 12 years old with the realization that his father had been gone for six years.
“I searched my soul and realized that it was on that day that many things in my life changed, that instead of living in my father’s shadow I decided no, I have to be my own person,” Menoufy said.
As part of his efforts to create stronger communities at home and abroad, Menoufy established three initiatives: Building Bridges, Closing the Gap and Youth for Better Understanding. The overall goal of each of these organizations is to “promote education and diversity in order to establish a greater place for peace in our world.”
The Building Bridges Initiative focuses on “programs that promote the exchange of culture, knowledge and experience.” One aspect of Building Bridges is based on creating and supporting programs such as the Sacramento World Music & Dance Festival, Call for Unity and Songs of Hope.
Songs of Hope — an annual event that brings together Arab and Israeli musicians to perform in Sacramento — holds a special place in Menoufy’s heart.
“It really touched me when we were able to bring Palestinians and Israelis together,” Menoufy said. “They played really beautiful music together and parted as very good friends.”
Menoufy’s enthusiasm for promoting peace through musical exchanges is shared by the Egyptian and Israeli consulates in San Francisco, who supported the April 2008 Songs of Hope concert (PDF, 80KB).
Building Bridges also holds an annual summit and supports delegations where it pairs education, government and business leaders from the United States and the Middle East to “collaborate on programs in health care, technology, agriculture and more.”
While deeply involved in international partnership efforts like Building Bridges, Menoufy also spends time helping California’s less fortunate through the Closing the Gap nonprofit organization.
Closing the Gap funds projects not only to help students improve their academic record and graduate from high school, but also to complete the necessary coursework for college admission or vocational training.
From the money he earned, and gave away, as a basketball player in Egypt, Menoufy learned the value of giving to others. “I always felt that sometimes all a person needs is a little help to make it. I believed and found it’s true that I always got back much more when I shared with others.”
Keeping young people in focus, Menoufy founded Youth for Better Understanding (YBU). YBU creates opportunities where youth bring harmony to their communities by developing programs to help others. Youth engage in programs that build interracial dialog (the Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration), they build houses for the poor (Habitat for Humanity) and they participate in peace demonstrations (the International Day of Peace) — to name a few of their activities.
“I didn’t call it YBU, the children called it YBU,” Menoufy said. “In the beginning it was ‘One God, One Message.’ But the children said it is not only about religion, it is about community, it is about creating a better understanding.”
Menoufy says it is important that Muslim Americans participate actively in their communities. For him, this could be as simple as sharing customs and traditions with their neighbors by inviting them to Ramadan iftars. He believes the more non-Muslims in America learn about Muslim values, the more they will see and appreciate Muslim contributions to society, to family and to American culture while diminishing negative perceptions of Islam.
In the future, Menoufy plans to continue his community projects and even spend more time on them with Delegata’s expected success. With added financial growth from his national and international business activities, Menoufy aims to further the cause of peace through Building Bridges by bringing the concept directly to the Middle East.
“I want to spend my time in the future by going to Gaza, to Tel Aviv, to Jerusalem, to Damascus, to Cairo, to bring people who are misunderstanding each other together,” Menoufy said.
Menoufy’s endeavors seem to have taken on a life of their own. Programs like Building Bridges, Closing the Gap and Youth for Better Understanding highlight Menoufy’s belief in giving back to society. People like the JACL’s Tsukamoto see a long-lasting impact resulting from his efforts.
“Kais is someone that through his own vision and commitment has created something that is larger than what he could do individually and one that will have a longer sustaining life,” she said.
