Sport Relief 2012: A letter from today's guest editor, David Walliams

Quality newspapers are normally quite boring. Not monumentally boring, just a bit dull and worthy. If they were a colour, they would be brown.

So today I have tried to make this paper as multicoloured as possible. Therefore I have put two supermodels on the front page (surely people would rather see Lara Stone and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley than George Osborne?), and interviewed two of the most fascinating people in Britain today, Eddie Izzard and Simon Cowell.

Everyone I asked to contribute, from Usain Bolt to Bill Gates, said Yes. Why? I don't think particularly because of the paper, or because it was me asking. They said Yes because it's for Sport Relief.

Sport and charity both have huge power to bring people together, and combined they are unstoppable. Sport Relief has to be (with Comic Relief) one of the most trusted charities in the world.

All the sale proceeds from The Independent's print edition today will go to Sport Relief. It will help those living in poverty in some of the world's poorest countries, and in the UK.

Last year, I visited Kisumu in Kenya and met a 12-year-old boy, Philip Onyango, whose parents died four years ago. This polite little boy has been living on the streets ever since.

The charity funds a centre that provides him with food, education and clothing. I asked him: "What would you like to be when you are older?"

"A pilot," he answered, quickly and confidently.

By buying The Independent print edition today, you can help bring Philip a little closer to his dream, of one day making a better life for himself.

So from me, and him, thank you.

Sport Relief 2012 - full links to special edition edited by David Walliams