FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat
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In the Name of Allah, All Merciful, Most Merciful
Allah the Ever-Present says, “Were it not for Allah’s favour to you and His mercy, a group of them would almost have managed to mislead you. But they mislead no one but themselves and do not harm you in any way. Allah has sent down the Book and Wisdom to you and taught you what you did not know before. Allah’s favour to you is indeed immense.” Surah An-Nisa’ (The Women) 4; Verse 113
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Title: FREE TO BE MUSLIM Author: Malik Arafat First Online Edition: August 2019 For FREE Distribution Language: English Characters: Futura Md BT 10, 11 and 12 Design and Typesetting: Malik Arafat Copyright: Malik Arafat ISBN: 000-0-0000000-0- Produced in South Africa Publisher and Distributer
African Muslim Assembly of Azania (AMA-AZANIA) 1367 Merapelo Street, Dube Village 1800, South Africa Cellphone: +27 79 839 0701 Email: [email protected] Facebook:Ama-Azania WhatsApp:+27 79 839 0701 (Ama Azania) Moya Messenger: :+27 79 839 0701 (Ama-Azania)
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CONTENTS PAGE
Introduction 7
Background to Christian Conversions 11 11 1 1
Some Mediterranean Influences 14
Some African Influences 20
Chrlistian Input to Struggle Against Apartheid 26
Background to origins of Islam 28
Background to Islam in South Africa 30
What is Islam 36
Conclusion 40
Appendix 1: Mandla Mandela’s Conversion 46
Appendix 2: Media Statement by MUCOSA 50
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INTRODUCTION
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
As Salaamu alaikum (Peace be with you).
My name is Malik Arafat and I embraced Islam in 1979 in Soweto after it was introduced to me by my maternal uncle Bushy Masilo – who is still to date not Muslim. My family members and relatives are Christians, atheists, communists, socialists, capitalists, African traditionalists and come from amaSwati, Batswana, KhoiSan, amaXhosa, Bapedi, Basotho, Coloureds, Ugandans, Nigerians and more through marriage and kinship. Yet we still relate very well and there has never been a moment when we made issue of our differences or argued about religion, tradition and culture.
I write this book in response to the recent media hype regarding the conversion to Islam of the chief of AbaThembu in Mvezo, South Africa, Chief Zwelivelile Mandla Mandela (grandson of Anti-Apartheid struggle icon and former South African President Rolihlahla Mandela), and his subsequent February 2016 marriage to a Cape Muslim lady, Rabia Clarke. There have also been biased and misleading claims made in the media against Islam and or Muslims. The original article was written on the 18th of February 2016 and titled, “Open Letter about the conversion of Inkosi Mandla Mandela to Islam.”
Some of the issues of concern according to those alleged statements are that; Chief Mandela’s new religious affiliation is a problem. He cannot both lead the people of Mvezo and be a Muslim at the same time. He must step down as a chief of
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AbaThembu because the Mvezo people are not Muslims. That he is a traitor.
I believe that those alleged statements; Promote religious and racial intolerance; Imply Chief Mandela has no right to religious and marriage choices; Imply Rabia Clarke is viewed as a foreigner racially and religiously; Imply South African Muslims and Muslims in general are viewed negatively racially and religiously by some members of the public.
I believe that Chief Mandla Mandela and any other person in this country have the right to choose their religion and that this choice should not prejudice him or her in the execution of whatever type of private or public responsibilities, business undertakings, memberships, employment or contracts.
I also believe that any harmful action against Chief Mandla Mandela, his wife Rabia Clarke and or any such person, is an attack on Azanian Muslims in particular and generally on all people who follow other religions like Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and Traditional Beliefs.
I am concerned such statements may agitate attacks against minority Muslims like with previous xenophobic attacks against foreign nationals and since most of them were Muslim economic and political migrants and refugees from across Africa and south Asia.
We do however commend Contralesa for refuting the claims that their organisation is not welcoming Chief Mandla Mandela’s decision to marry a Muslim woman and reiterating his right to choose his religion and elaborating that it was his personal and constitutional right. Although they expressed disquiet about Chief Mandela “abandoning his family religion
8 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat in favour of his bride’s religion” they nevertheless expected him to uphold tribal customs and traditional practices.
The most notable position on this matter came from the Director of Icamagu Heritage Institute, Dr Nokuzola Mndende who made claims that if it is true that Mandela has converted to Islam;
i. He has betrayed his people, the ancestors and customs ii. He will face the wrath of his ancestors iii. He cannot claim to be the custodian of African customs iv. He has abandoned his African customs v. He has abandoned his own identity and vi. He has surrendered himself to another cultural practice
Dr Mndende attributed the above assertions to the claim that Muslim faith and African religions have strong contradicting doctrines since the “The Muslim faith is based on Arabic culture and [has] always perceived itself to be superior to African religion”. She further claimed that according to the Muslim faith, “nobody can marry someone who is not a Muslim” and that “As a Muslim you cannot perform African religion like slaughtering sacrificial oxen and goats”. Cii News and The Dispatch - 09 February 2016.
All those events happened in the backdrop of the unfortunate June 2015 brutal killing of Zaytuna Mlambo and the fatal stabbing of her brother Hashim Mlambo, in the Inchanga area of the Kwa-Zulu Natal Province, by a family member apparently opposed to their conversion to Islam. Unlike with the high profile Inkosi Mandla Mandela debate, the Mlambo case has gone largely unnoticed without any media coverage. The question is; how many such cases remain unknown?
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However many cannot dispute that an apple always falls next to its tree because Chief Mandla Mandela’s grandfather Nelson Mandela allegedly proposed marriage to Amina Cachalia (a fellow struggle stalwart and an old Muslim lady friend) in 1995 before he got married to Graca Machel on his 80th birthday. Cachalia turned him down. From “Mandela and Muslims: A historical Journey - Channel Islam International Broadcasting.”
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BACKGROUND TO CHRISTIAN CONVERSIONS
There is no doubt that the European colonial project in Africa benefited immensely from the intricate relationship they had established between the corporate merchants, royal mercenaries and Christian missionaries. This was the case that whenever the flag of their country was hoisted on conquered territory, a Christian monument was also erected. This was the case already with the Portuguese explorer Bartholomeu Diaz who immediately upon his arrival in the Cape in the year 1488, he erect a limestone pillar and a Christian cross.
In their book, “A History of the Church in Africa”, Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed write, “The Portuguese were not only motivated by the hope of finding lucrative trade, but were also inspired by religious zeal, although at this time their missionary involvement did not resemble the modern missionary movement. It was rather an expression of the medieval Catholic Church in its Lusitanian form. In principle, it was directed under the exclusive leadership of the king, who acted as the Grand Master of the Order of Christ.”
These quests for conquest took the Portuguese around the Cape to the Far East were they found fertile ground to rule their newly acquired possessions from. Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed further write that, “In the 1470s Portuguese sailors reached the mouth of the Zaire River, eager to make conquista for their king. In 1497 Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope with a squadron of four caravels and 150 men. They began to explore the East Coast of Africa, from Natal to Malindi. Then, with the aid of monsoon winds, they steered
11 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat across the Indian Ocean to India, where Goa became the centre of government and church in the Portuguese empire.”
It was however soon after the arrival of the Dutch in 1652 that an intimate relationship developed between the Dutch and the Khoi people that created the foundation for Christianity to grow. However those early cordial relations soon died after the Khoi experienced a smallpox ‘massacre’ in 1713 when the Khoi became more hostile towards the Dutch.
In that period, all the Dutch and other European passing ships that docked at the Cape and mingled with the Khoi, who soon learned the languages and ways of the new arrivals. Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed further write that, “An increasing number of Portuguese, Dutch, French and British ships followed. Occasionally, a young Khoikhoi would be taken on board ship to Britain, Holland or Indonesia in order to pick up a European language.”
It was however the public conversion of a Khoi lady that really gave rise to Christianity among the locals. Again Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed further write that, “The young Khoikhoi girl, Eva, surprised the van Riebeck family with her linguistic ability. She became an interpreter. Mrs van Riebeck taught her `Christianity' in order to become `the first Christian native of South Africa'.”
We also observe that those conversions made it possible for the Dutch to enslave the unsuspecting Khoi Christians who were also “rewarded” with intoxicants because the, “Dutch Reformed Church missionaries reported in 1658 that Khoikhoi slaves in the area attended their mission services (and were rewarded with a glass of brandy after the sermon).”
12 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat http://www.photius.com/countries/south_africa/society/south_ africa_society_the_arrival_ofchris~2450.html
That 1713 smallpox incident was by no means an isolated incident because through it the colonial project was able to eliminate the Khoi threat of resistance plus also weaken them because it, “drastically reduced the Khoikhoi population from over 200,000 in 1652, to a level that barely escaped annihilation.” It took the Khoi 132 years to finally comprehend those intentions and to openly revolt against the colonialists. Again Bengt Sundkler and Christopher Steed further write that, “In 1788 at Swellendam 200 servants led by millenarian visions ‘burnt their Dutch clothes, and killed their white animals, prophesying the end of the world and threatening to kill all whites, after which they would inherit their goods'.”
Having eliminated the Khoi threat, the number of slaves from Mozambique, Madagascar, India and Indonesia increased significantly so that, “In 1793 the European population - men, women and children - at the Cape numbered 14,000 while the slave population was 14,700.”
Those conversions were soon accompanied by the deliberate land invasions, dispossessions and enslavements, whose objective was to destroy the cultural and social fibre of locals. After their initial conversion onslaught on the Khoisan, the Europeans continued to attempt to convert the rest of the people of this country to Christianity and this resulted in African kings and chiefs having to wage wars to protect their subjects and understandably, “The relationships among indigenous African leaders, missionaries, and European settlers and officials were always complex. Missionaries whose efforts were frustrated by local chiefs sometimes sought government
13 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat intervention to weaken the chiefs' power. Government officials relied in part on the influence of missionaries in order to convince indigenous Africans of the validity of European customs.” http://www.photius.com/countries/south_africa/society/south_ africa_society_the_arrival_ofchris~2450.html
In another sense, all of this became the backbone for that massive defeat of amaXhosa peoples and their surrender to colonialism and Christianity in 1857 that came about as a consequence of the maiden Nongqawuse’s missionary induced maliciously false vision or “prophecy” telling of an end to British domination and the victory of the amaXhosa people if they killed all their cattle and destroyed their food stocks.
Many historians point to a white missionary imposter pretending to be Nongqawuse’s ancestor instructing her to pass the message to her people. Again Nongqawuse’s prophesies in this instance are strangely similar to those of the Khoi in the 1788 Swellendam revolt.
This massacre resulted in over 400,000 cattle killed and more than 40,000 people dead and whole villages destroyed. Those who survived the starvation were forced to seek refuge in Christian camps, convert to Christianity, endure missionary education and then work as cheap labour for colonial masters. That single catastrophic event cannot be forgotten and the present day generation of royalty plus all the leaders on the ground need to constantly remind our people about such atrocities and many others.
But again that tragedy was not by chance, it was as a result of the European belief in the hierarchy of races that places white Europeans at the top of the ladder and black Africans, at the
14 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat lowest rung. The “Race Issue” is a socially constructed meaning attached to a variety of physical attributes including but not limited to skin and eye colour, hair texture, bone structure and accent that negatively affects people of dark hue across the world while it positively benefits people of fair complexion in what is known as the “White Privilege”. White in this instance denotes the confluence of both a race and a culture. Racism is in many ways the outcome of a combination of deliberate prejudice and acquired power. We can then argue that White Privilege was, and still is to a great extent, the immediate beneficiary of racism in the past that was as a result of the historical inextricably interwoven cahoots between corporate merchants, royal mercenaries and Christian missionaries, since the 1488 arrival of Bartholomeu Diaz on South African shores.
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SOME MEDITERRANEAN INFLUENCES
The peoples on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea - North Africa and South Europe have shared relationships and interactions since times before the Pharaohs. It was also common for Europeans to purchase black slaves from North African and in reverse Africans also bought blonde slaves from North Europe along both coasts.
Fast forward to the Atlantic Slave trade, for the colonial Europeans to justify and legitimise those illicit transactions,
A theory that Black people have always been slaves, have limited intellectual capacity, have low or no moral values, have always been primitive and barbaric and are generally a people without a history, had been created and endorsed for the specific reason of justifying all wrongs committed against them. This was sanctioned by the unrealistic and hilarious climatic premise “that blacks originate from whites and were turned black by the exposure to extreme tropical sunlight” that also contributed to their inherent animal like inferior nature.
That assertion is in direct contrast to evidence given by former Senegalese President, Leopold Sedar Sengkor about the African origin of people on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea in a lecture delivered in the Indian city of Madras under the auspices of the International Institute of Tamil Studies on the 23rd May, 1974, when he said, “Consequently, it might have been less ambiguous, as some experts have done, to call that Mediterranean race the ‘Negroid race’, since its characteristics are precisely those of the blacks in general: an elongated skull, dark or brown skin, these two adjectives being
16 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat quite often euphemisms for ‘black’. I refer you to Alexander Moret’s description of the ancient Mediterraneans. This is the place to mention once again the fact that the ancient Greeks did not label as white the former inhabitants of North-West Africa, that is to say, of the present Magreb - Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia - since they called the inhabitants Mauroi or ‘moors’, meaning men with ‘a dark skin’. And Herodotus tells us that the Colchidians, a Middle East people, were as ‘Black as Egyptians’.”
That statement by Leopold Sedar Sengkor further demonstrates the centrality of the Mediterranean conflicts of civilisations in modern day politics wherein a false narrative of a white Europe dominant in morals, sciences, culture, politics and economy that was and is still being constantly beamed across the conquered third world.
This denial of African historicity in south Europe in particular by modern historians and scholars is central to this type of racism that was necessary at the height of colonialism to justify their wrong actions against native Africans, Asians and Americans.
The arrival of Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam in Europe did not change those racial tendencies, but only increased them. European anthropologists relegated African traditional beliefs to barbarians and people without a history and declared them un-Abrahamic, thus effectively distancing black Africans from divine revelation and separating them along false anthropological tribal lines. This division was for that reason necessary to continue enslaving the so-called barbaric and un-Abrahamic African people.
Islam teaches us that all people originate from Adam and Eve (Hawa) and that all the indigenous people of the world are
17 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat practitioners of the fitra (original pure belief) given to them by God. Islam also teaches that Abraham was an upholder of the fitra and Allah says, “They say, ‘Be Jews or Christians and you will be guided.’ Say, ‘Rather adopt the religion of Ibrahim, a man of fitra (natural pure belief). He was not one of the idolaters’.” Surah al-Baqara (The Cow) 2; Verse 135. Again the Prophet said, “Every child is born with fitra (natural pure belief). Only his parents (his environment) make him a Jew, Christian or Zoroastrian.”
Thus through such statements, Islam immediately elevates all of mankind, regardless of their background, by acknowledging the superiority of the natural beliefs as being pure and godly thus defeating the notion of inferiority and barbaricity as propagated by colonial scholarship.
Therefore the theory of Abrahamic and un-Abrahamic faiths can only be based on faulty ideas that found their way into some interpretations of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The most popular premise being that of the Biblical Tower of Babel giving us the picture of Noah cursing his grandson Canaan and his offspring by bestowing them with a black skin, rugged features, never-ending slavery, low intelligence, low lifestyles, love for theft, immorality, fornication and lying. Those types of texts only reinforced the racism against black Africans that played itself out on the stage of history with imperialism, colonialism, dispossession and genocides that produced the Mediterranean Sea castrated slavery, the Atlantic Ocean economic slave trade and Indian Ocean conquest slavery that was sanctioned by Europeans, Arabs, Indians and others.
It is common knowledge that the western world tends to distance itself from Islam, yet there are many instances that
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Muslims of African origin dominated Europe for about 800 years from their Capital City of Cordoba in Spain and introduced to them a philosophy accompanied by learning, advanced cultures, customs, traditions and sciences. Muslims did not discriminate the local population, Jews and Christians and they studied sciences and philosophy together. Great Muslim thinkers like Ibn Rushd practiced law and medicine in the same spaces with famous Jewish thinkers like Solomon ben Gabirol who taught philosophy and composed poetry.
From the 700s to the 1400s, Muslim and Jewish scholars translated Greek writings into Arabic, which was the lingua franca of administration and scholarship in those days, and it was only when those works were translated into Latin, that western Europeans became aware of Greek thinking. It was again Muslim and Arabic scholarship that finally widened their understanding about the world beyond Europe.
However, of great significance was how Latin had been influenced by Arabic to become the official language of Christianity as a result of the proximity of the two religions and their followers across the European and African Mediterranean shores. Bernard Lewis in his book “Europe and Islam” says, “In many ways, medieval Islam and medieval Christendom spoke the same language. To some extent and in some places this was true even in the literal sense. In many Mediterranean countries, Muslims and Christians shared not only the local vernaculars but also knowledge of Arabic. Shared concepts, and shared vocabularies to denote them, made it possible not only to argue but to translate religious texts. Those medieval monks who
19 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat translated the Koran into Latin in order to refute it were able to do so because Latin, by that time a Christian language, had the necessary terms. In contrast, when converts tried to translate the Koran from Arabic into Persian and Turkish and Indian languages, they had to take their Arabic vocabulary with them, because these languages, and the cultures of which they were the expression, did not possess either the concepts or the corresponding terms.”
In that regard, it is only when you interrogate south European languages and realise the amount of Arabic words imbedded in them that you will realise how much they borrowed from Arabic and Muslims.
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SOME AFRICAN INFLUENCES
We can also see similar Islamic influences that can also be observed in certain African systems. A case in hand is the adoption of the geomantic system in divination practiced by African diviners. Many tend to relegate this noble science to backward black nations practicing black magic, yet when faced with private and family conflicts, they stealthily hasten to consult diviners in the dark of the night.
Wim van Binsbergen in his book, “Islam as a Constitutive Factor in African ‘Traditional’ Religion - The Evidence from Geomantic Divination” argues that African traditional divination and their diviner ranks of isangoma (singular) izangoma (plural) [spirit medium or diviner-priest and also derogatively called ‘witchdoctors’ by westerners] and their amathwasa (initiates) “may be surmised to share a common origin on African soil”. He claims many herbalists and sangomas across Southern Africa use, as the dominant tools by means of which geomantic divination is carried out, four rectangular or triangular tablets (hakata or ditaola).
Again Wim van Binsbergen further argues that geomantic divination was, “First introduced into West European intellectual life in the 11th century CE, when numerous Arabic texts were translated into Latin, geomancy as a divination method became associated with the most prominent representatives of the occult sciences in medieval and Renaissance times, including Bernardus Silvestris, Roger Bacon, Albertus Magnus, Cornelius Agrippa and Robert Fludd. In Arabic the geomantic system was originally known as ilm al-raml, khatt al-raml or khatt bi’l raml.
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It was treated extensively by such learned authors as Muhammad al-Zanati, ‘Ali b. Umar, Fadhl b. Sahl al-Saraksi, and Ahmad b. ‘Ali Zunbul. In Europe, this imported system was pursued by major Renaissance magicians such as Agrippa and Fludd, and subsequently popularised through mass-produced ‘Books of Fate’. ‘Punctuation’ (as it was called after its characteristic patterns of dots) became a self-help oracle even in the rural peripheries of European life right up to modern times.”
The irony of history is that, the French defeated Algerian Muslims by using magic against them. In 1856 the French Emperor Napoleon III instructed Jean-Eugène Robert (Houdini), a magician considered the father of modern day stage performance style magic, to counter the anti-France revolution inspired by the Algerian Murabitun (Muslim Religious Leaders). Brad Steiger writes in his document, “The French Magician Who Squelched A Revolt”, that “Robert-Houdin performed for the tribes, making objects disappear, levitating, and performing other acts of illusion. However it was Houdin’s bullet catch trick and “light chest, heavy chest” act which astounded them the most. Then Houdin asked the largest strongest man of the tribe to attempt to lift his “light chest, heavy chest”. On the first attempt the strong tribesman easily lifted the chest. Then Robert- Houdin waved his wand over the tribesman saying “Behold! Now you are weaker than a woman; try to lift the box.” When the tribesman tried to lift the handle of the chest, it would not budge. In a fit of anger the tribesman attempted to smash the box, which only gave the tribesman a strong electrical shock as Houdin had rigged it to do so if tampered with. Amazed by Houdin’s incredible French magic, the Algerian tribes were convinced to submit to France and the rebellion was peacefully suppressed.”
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Thus while denigrating Islam and Africans, on the other hand Europeans continued to take and or “steal” knowledge from both Muslims and Africans. In his memorable book, “The African Origin of Civilization – Myth or Reality”, the Senegalese natural scientist and cultural philosopher Cheikh Anta Diop says, “It is simply a matter of providing a few landmarks to persuade the incredulous Black African reader to bring himself to verify this. To his great surprise and satisfaction, he will discover that most of the ideas used today to domesticate, atrophy, or steal his ‘soul’ were conceived by his own ancestors. To become conscious of that fact is perhaps the first step toward a genuine retrieval of himself; without it, intellectual sterility is the general rule, or else the creations bear I know not what imprint of the subhuman.”
For those reasons, indigenous South Africans suffered greatly at the hands of new-comer Europeans and that misery also touched the KhoiSan, amaXhosa, baSotho and others. The so- called black African’s lack of belief and history was therefore a critical justification for the imposition of the European version of Trinitarian Christianity on them while stealing their lands and resources with the hidden hand.
A matter worth mentioning is how post-Apartheid South Africa responds to African Traditional Religion practices. In his book, “African Traditional Religion in the face of Secularism in South Africa”, Dr Sibusiso Masondo, a lecturer in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Cape Town, argues that a number of African Traditional Religion practices have caught the attention of the public and a case in hand was that, “Ukweshwama is one of the rituals that have captured the nation’s imagination and sparked a fierce debate and contestation that ended up in court. The meaning and content of
23 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat the celebration were not the contested subjects. The Animal Rights Activists petitioned the High Court in Pietermaritzburg to instruct the Zulu King not to allow the ritual killing of the bull during the celebrations in 2009 because it constituted cruelty to the animal in question. Ukweshwama can be described as the ritual of the first fruit. During this ritual, the King – who is the first citizen, the ritual leader (chief priest), the link between the royal ancestors and the rest of the group – would taste the first fruit of the season.
One of the major aspects of this ritual is thanksgiving to the ancestors for their provision. It highlights an important link between people and the environment on which they depend. However, what became part of the public debate was the apparent barbarism and cruelty of killing the bull. The Animal Rights Activists failed to convince the court and it confirmed the right of the King to have the ritual without any alterations. The ecological aspect of ukweshwama was debated and reports about the custom never mention it. After going to court and winning the contest, King Zwelithini announced during the celebrations in 2009 that he was reinstituting circumcision as part of male initiation. Being aware of problems experienced by AmaXhosa with regard to this issue, he pointed out that he was going to consult other African groups and enlist the help of the medical fraternity in carrying out circumcisions. By doing this he responded to critics of virginity testing that it only focused on girls.”
Although Muslims may argue against slaughtering in the name of ancestors, however they also annually perform animal sacrifices. This is considered to have divine origins because the Prophet Abraham was given a ram by God to slaughter and
24 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat this has become part of the practices of the Annual Hajj (Pilgrimage) to the Ka’ab (House of Prayer) first built by Adam in Mecca, Arabia.
With regards to the practices of the African Traditional Religions, clearly some forces continue to demand the denigration of these traditions and the courts in this instance came to the assistance of the king. There are many similar practices that have not been publicly tested and it remains to be seen how South Africa law, curiously derived from Roman Dutch Law, can be used to reverse and overcome those historical imbalances.
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CHRISTIAN INPUT TO STRUGGLE AGAINST APARTHEID
Generally Christianity in South Africa has three branches; Settler, Missionary and Indigenised Christianity. Settler Christianity was and remains a reflection of versions of migrant Christianity as practiced by each settler group like the English with the Anglican Church. This gave each nationality a sense of identity and continuity with institutions and traditions of their mother country in Europe.
Missionary Christianity was founded by the same settler Christians with the sole purpose of propagating Christianity amongst indigenous peoples. For that purpose they had established mutual relationships with their counterpart settler governors who assisted with the necessary legal and judiciary enforcements. This relationship resulted in land dispossessions, people displacements, the undermining of local legal, social, economic and political practices. The settler missionaries further established schools, universities, clinics and hospitals. They then Latinised local languages (literally created new languages by grouping various dialects together), translated Bibles and religious texts into those languages, published newspapers and other journals which had widespread social, cultural and political impact on the lifestyles of early Black Christians. Some of those missionary educated Black Christians were elevated to the status of “educated Black Elite” and others eventually became leaders of liberation movements and the newly created Nation States.
Whereas over time, African converts to Christianity recognised the need to develop their own indigenous structures, which led
26 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat to the formation of indigenised independent African Christian denominations such as the Bantu Congregational Church (United Congregational Church), the Tsonga Presbyterian Church (Evangelical Presbyterian Church), and the Bantu Presbyterian Church (Reformed Presbyterian Church), Zion Christian Church, Shembe’s Nazarite Church and others. It is these Indigenised Christian Churches that successfully integrated many African traditional beliefs, practices and systems to produce uniquely African Christian Churches.
Although Christianity brings back negative images of its past, it today has and continues to play a significant role of nation building and reconciliation. Mention can be made of the role the South African Christian Council of Churches played in the anti-Apartheid movement and many prominent clergy like the nobel prize winner and social rights defender Anglican Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Mpilo Tutu, Bishop Stanley Mmutlanyane Mogoba of the Pan Africanist Congress of South Africa and the English Anglican Bishop Trevor Huddleston and many more who are today revered throughout the country and the world for the immense work done against Apartheid.
How many Kings and Chiefs of our people profess Christianity as their religion today? Does their belief bar them from leading their people? Again, how many Kings and Chiefs were educated in Britain under the tutelage of the British throne? Does their allegiance to the British monarchy alienate them from their people? Why is Inkosi Mandla Mandela singled out from the rest? Is it about him in person or about his choice of belief?
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BACKGROUND TO ORIGINS OF ISLAM
Muslims generally consider Islam as a continuation of instructions from God to all His Prophets and Messengers from Adam to Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad (may peace be with all of them). However, Islam as revealed and taught to Muhammad (peace be upon him) originated in Arabia. For this purpose, it is again worth noting that the original Arabs were black Africans. In his book, “The African Presence in Muslim Lands” Runoko Rashidi says, “The Arabian peninsula, first inhabited more than 8,000 years ago, was early populated by Blacks. Once dominant over the entire peninsula, the African presence in early Arabia is most clearly traceable through the Sabeans. The Sabeans were the first Arabians to step firmly within the realm of civilization. The southwestern corner of the peninsula was their early home. This area, which was known to the Romans as Arabia Felix, embraces the country that is today called Yemen. In antiquity this region gave rise to a high degree of civilization because of the fertility of the soil, the growth of frankincense and myrrh, and the close proximity to the sea and consequently its importance in the trade routes. The Sabeans have even been called ‘the Phoenicians of the southern seas’. One of the earliest known Sabean construction project was probably the Marib Dam (possibly South Arabia's most enduring technical achievement). Serving the South Arabians for more than a thousand years, the Marib Dam is traditionally believed to have been conceived by Lokman (Luqman), the sage and multi-genius of pre-Islamic South Arabia.”
Rashidi further says, “Before the advent of Islam southern Arabia already possessed the sacred Kaaba sanctuary, with its
28 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat black stone, at Makkah. Diop claimed that ‘The Kaaba was reputed to have been constructed by Ishmael son of Abraham and Hagar the Egyptian (a Negro woman), historical ancestor of Mohammed, according to all Arab historians’. ‘In Egypt he [Abraham] had married a Negro woman, Hagar, mother of Ishmael, the Biblical ancestor of the second Semitic branch, the Arabs. Ishmael was said to be the historical ancestor of Mohammed’. The city of Makkah was considered a holy place and the destination of pilgrims long before the prophet Muhammad. Muhammad himself, who was to unite the whole of Arabia, appears to have had a prominent African lineage. According to al-Jahiz, the guardian of the sacred Kaaba -Abd al- Muttalib, ‘fathered ten Lords, Black as the night and magnificent’. One of these men was Abdallah, the father of Muhammad. According to tradition, the first Muslim killed in battle was Mihdja – a Black man. Another Black man, Bilal, was such a pivotal figure in the development of Islam that he has been referred to as "a third of the faith”. ‘Many of the earliest Muslim converts were Africans, and a number of the Muslim faithful sought refuge in Ethiopia because of Arabian hostility to Muhammad's teachings’.”
Islam consequently grew to dominate Africa, South Europe and Asia for well over 1400 years and it spawned great civilisations, sciences and advancements in algebra, surgery, irrigation, universities and more. Today Muslim lands constitute the largest single territory colonised by Europeans and are divided into multiple (majority and minority states) from Morocco to Malaysia and Moscow to Mozambique.
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BACKGROUND TO ISLAM IN SOUTH AFRICA
Although both recorded Christianity and Islam arrived at the same time on the shores of South Africa, as belief systems of masters and slaves respectively, Christianity got an early start because it received formidable assistance and promotion by various colonial governments who were in cahoots with imperial corporate business and Christian missionaries, while Islam was harassed and sidelined in the same way as indigenous African belief systems.
The earliest Muslim permanent inhabitants in the Cape were political leaders, merchants, tradesmen, princes and political prisoners (held from 1641 to 1824) from various colonies like Indonesian, Java, Borneo, Malaya, Sumatra, South India, Madagascar and East Africa. These people lived as slaves and or subjects of the dominant European colonists and were therefore severely restricted in their practice of Islam.
In fact Islam started as a banned religion in the Cape. It was Jan Van Riebeeck in 1657, who requested that free Muslims (Amboinese) from the Maluku Islands in Indonesia be sent to the Cape as a labour force, but were, “prohibited from openly practising Islam in accordance with the Statute of India, drafted in 1642 by Van Dieman, which stated in one of its placaats [statutes]: ‘No one shall trouble the Amboinese about their religion or annoy them; so long as they do not practise in public or venture to propagate it amongst Christians and heathens. Offenders to be punished with death, but should there be amongst them those who had been drawn to God to become Christians, they were not to be prevented from joining Christian
30 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat churches.’ The Placaat governed the Cape Muslims as part of the Dutch Colonial Empire”. From Wikipedia – Islam in South Africa.
Islam was then severely restricted to a limited number of slaves and could not grow through propagation in the Cape under that statute, while Christianity was imposed and expected on all the residents and it therefore flourished both in the Cape and across the territory. Many leading Muslims were incarcerated on Robben Island for various reasons and the most known was Imam Abdullah Ibn Qadhi Abdus-Salaam also known as Tuan Guru. He was a prince from Tidore in the Maluku Islands and a descendant of the Sultan of Morocco. The Dutch banished him to the Cape in 1780 and he was then incarcerated on Robben Island for 12 years until 1792. While on the island, Tuan Guru wrote several copies of the Glorious Qur’an from memory and also authored several books on Islamic jurisprudence. After his release, he went on to establish the first mosque in South Africa in 1794. Others were Sheikh Yusuf, Sheikh Abdur Rahmaan Matura, Tuan Sa'id Alawi and many more that were brought as slaves to the Cape or later as indentured labourers from India to work the sugar fields of Natal.
Similarly Muslim slaves from several east African chiefdoms of the Yao, Mwera, Makua, Makonde and others were taken as slaves to the Americas via Madagascar and or the Cape. During one of those expeditions, the Sao Jose slave ship was wreck near the Cape. The ship had originally left Lisbon, Portugal in 1794 for Mozambique past the Cape in order to pick up nearly 500 east African slaves, and on its way back to Brazil, it was caught in a bad storm and sunk. Consequently
31 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat about 200 surviving slaves were sold in the Cape slave market. The British later settled more east African Muslim slaves, who became popularly known as Zanzibaris, in Durban. They were again called Siddi people, like similar former slaves who share the same origin and name in the Indian subcontinent and are also known as Sheedi, Habshi or Makrani. Some of these people were merchants, sailors, mercenaries and or indentured servants (slaves), although the vast majority were taken to the Indian subcontinent as slaves by Arab and Portuguese merchants. Most of the Siddi community is currently located in the provinces of Karnataka, Gujarat and Hyderabad in India and Makran and Karachi in Pakistan.
The past 350 years saw a clear separation between Christianity and Islam in South Africa resulting in both growing into two separate and unequal religions. Christianity had become associated with governments and regimes that practiced slavery, dispossessed people of their lands and oppressed them. Although history points to Muslims practicing slavery in other parts of Africa, however, Muslims in South Africa were clear victims of slavery by colonists and their Christian buddies.
That past resulted in today’s demographics showing about two percent (2%) of South Africans being Muslims as against an overwhelming eighty percent (80%) of our population who profess variations of Christianity. In all of that, Islam was and still remains a victim of Christian Europe and for that reason, no one can make negative claims about Islam having harmed the peoples of this country, instead Muslims have suffered and continue to suffer the negative effects of both colonialism and Apartheid. Muslims shared the same fate experienced by
32 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat exponents of traditional religion since both were disliked and harassed by colonial forces.
Muslims have always taken part in and supported all the efforts to resist colonialism and have also featured prominently in the struggle against Apartheid. Notably in the struggle against Apartheid, were Muslim activists such as Imam Abdullah Haroon, the Imam of Stegman Road Mosque, who was murdered in detention by Apartheid security police in 1969. In 1981 Achmad Cassiem founded Qibla, an Africanist Muslim organization aligned to the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC). Another Qibla leader Yusuf Patel, was also active in the Black Consciousness Movement. Another was the struggle stalwart Hassan Ghila, who was part of the original group that left the African National Congress of South Africa to form the PAC in the late 1959. Ghila later became a senior Qibla member. In 1983 Abdarahman Vus’muzi kaZwane founded and led the Murabitun South Africa and also influenced many African Muslims to take part in the freedom struggle aligned to the PAC.
Generally between the 70’s and 90’s prominent figures like Ahmad Matsobane, Fakhruddin Masia, Don Umar Mattera, Sulaiman “Stiga” Mahlangu, Sulaiman Nchinyane, Hamza Mbhele and many others made their mark in the struggle arena. Many like Keromilwe Sahnun Dikotla and Muhammad Phiri were martyred by Apartheid forces and are buried in unmarked graves, while some suffered incarceration, lost limbs and broken families in pursuance of the freedom struggle. Some of those who survived like General Farouq Sukwana and many more who played their roles as Qibla, Apla and MK operatives, are today still either serving Apartheid imposed prison sentences across the country or have been reduced to
33 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat poverty and suffering because their contributions to the freedom struggle have been belittled.
There are presently many indigenous African Muslims, with clear royal lineages like Chief Aubrey Ahmad Somana; a relative of Chief Mandla Mandela and Muhammad Luthuli; a grandson of Chief Albert Luthuli, who led his tribe from 1933, and later became Africa’s first Nobel Peace Prize Laureate in 1960. Luthuli was also President-General of the African National Congress (ANC) from December 1952 until his suspicious tragic train accident death in 1967. There is also ANC Member of Parliament Naledi Mandisa Pandor, daughter of respected struggle stalwart Z.K. Matthews and many more.
Similarly South Africa hosts great Muslim sportsmen like the renowned boxer Elijah “Joe Flash” Nyakale, who held the SA Middleweight title in 1954 followed by Maxwell Malinga who won the SA Welterweight title in 1973 and the Middleweight in 1977. Orlando Pirates Footbal Club local and international players like Rashid “Bomber” Khan, Junaid Hartley, Moeneeb Josephs, Boubacar Talatou, Haytham Tambal and Issa Sarr. What about Zane “Koloi ya Bakgatla” Moosa who played for the South African National Football Team Bafana Bafana, Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs Footbal Clubs respectively? In cricket we have the likes of fast bowler Wayne Parnell, Hashim Amla and Farhaan Behardien.
Again we have great musicians like the multi instrumentalist and producer Pops Mohamed and South Africa’s most distinguished and world acclaimed pianist and master musician Abdullah Ibrahim and many more. What more about educationists like Professor Khadija ‘KC’ Kholeka Moloi, Shaikh Ebrahim Etsko Schuitema, Dr Amina Ngubane, Dr Tahir Sitoto
34 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat and many more. Writers like Edriss Khamisa, Ebrahim Mphutlane wa-Bofelo, politicians and administrators like Jihad Mohapi, Kobimpe Moqejwa and many more.
Inkosi Mandla Mandela also joins this illustrious list of great South Africans who profess the faith of Islam, like Western Cape Judge President John Yahya Hlophe, who also married a Muslim lady in the Cape.
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WHAT IS ISLAM?
All Muslims from different races and parts of the world believe that God is One and has no partner; that Muhammad (peace be upon him) is the Last Prophet; that all Prophets and Messengers are from the same God and that they all came with the same message that says “There is Only One God to be worshipped”. Islam is an African religion and Muslims are the majority 60% of its people. Three of Africa’s largest languages, Arabic, Hausa and Swahili, are spoken by various Muslim communities, tribes and nations across north, west and east Africa. Islam is also the fastest growing religion in the world with over 1.2 billion followers worldwide.
In the main, Islam is not a religion in the narrow sense as many are made to believe. Islam describes itself as Deen al- Islam generally translated as “The Way of Islam” implying a lifestyle rather than a set of dogmas. Again in the Quran the Prophet Abraham is always equated with having lived a life of fitra (pure natural way, natural customs or original customs) that govern every aspect of all indigenous peoples worldwide. Therefore Islam comes to confirm the “fitra” nature of people or “Setho” in seSotho or “isiNtu” in isiNguni. You can as well deduct that Islam does not contradict the fitra of the people but confirms it. One of the companions of the Prophet, Abu Huraira, narrates that the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said, “No child is born except on the fitra and then his parents make him Jewish, Christian or Magian (Zoroastrian), as an animal produces a perfect young animal; do you see any part of its body amputated?”
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You see that confirmation in the similarities between Islam and the African Traditional Ways (Religion); for instance about how marriages are contracted with the bringing together of families to legalise the marriage of a groom and bride. In the early days, a moSotho and moTswana woman would grow up with some form of wealth passed on or granted (ho abelwa) to her by her parents in the form of cattle, goats and sheep. When the man gives the mahar (Arabic) or mahadi (seSotho) or lobola (isiNguni) or what the English incorrectly call the bride price, it was always calculated at market value of the cattle, goats and sheep in the locality at that time. Remember that paper money was non-existent then and currency was measured in shells and livestock. Cattle became the main means of exchange because of their abundance and prestige and had intrinsic value in themselves like with all commodities (gold, silvers, grains, shells etc).
While the groom deposited the lobola at his in-laws, his bride would bring with her, her own cattle, goats, sheep, assets and gifts to her newly found family and these possessions would be hers to keep apart from her husbands or in-laws. Thus maintaining sole and exclusive right and access to them, for her personal use primarily and marital needs secondarily. Therefore lobola was always been seen as two sides of one coin; the groom offers assets to the bride’s family and the bride brings with, her assets into the grooms family, which is actually an exchange of currencies between the two marrying parties. That is why there are always intense negotiations between both party’s representatives prior and during the actual marriage process. Both families expect to marry into the “right family” with the “right pedigree” so that the groom’s family does not end up economically responsible for the bride,
37 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat while the bride’s family is assured of her upkeep even when the groom struggles, becomes incapacitated or dies unceremoniously. The bride benefits from both sides of the coin.
This marriage process is the same in Islam and in fact Islam even goes further by allowing the woman to determine and keep her mahar (dowry). The act of keeping that dowry, frees the woman from her man economically and she can trade, own property and assets, give gifts, dispose them off and make any types of transactions without seeking the man’s (or his family’s) consent.
This was and is still the single most important determiner and yardstick of a free society. It is only free women who can build free families and free families make free societies. Unlike today where the majority of women are lured to the work place to be under-paid and then be burdened with interest-debt bonds and instalments – easily obtained from banks and retail stores. Today’s women are not free because they have been indebted; therefore their families and societies are also indebted and enslaved to the debt masters. Again with tertiary education, debt has not spared students, leading them to indebtedness by the time they join the labour market. Once they have entered the trap, getting out of it is not easy because they have to pay back those loans, sometimes in compounded interest, and thereafter every purchase until their death will be interest burdened.
As part of their desire to destroy the African societal structures and turn its people into their political, social and economic slaves, “The British also abolished traditional economic practices, such as the Xhosa custom of paying lobola, or
38 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat bridewealth given by the family of a groom to that of his bride. But abolishing an element of traditional culture almost always resulted in an array of unforeseen cultural consequences, and this was especially true when the practices being eliminated were central to a group's social organization, as was the lobola”. http://www.photius. com/countries/south_africa/society/south_africa_society_the arrival_of_chris~2450.html
Some other similarities between Islam and traditional African ways is that Africans revere leadership and similarly Islam encourages the same and teaches that every group of three must appoint one of them as a leader. When someone dies, the deceased would be covered in cow hide and buried the same day. They would never be kept more than three days unburied. Islam teaches the same and a cheap piece of white calico cloth covers the influential, the rich and the poor and both are buried in the same way. The elders receive the greatest respect both when alive and have passed on. It is common for Muslims to visit the graves of their parents to make prayers for them, although they do not make the claim that the dead have the capacity to change the fortunes of the living as some people claim. Similarly no act of importance is done without invoking thanks to the deceased ancestors. Islam believes and teaches that no act of a child can repay the nine months a child spent in its mother’s womb and this is confirmed by the statement, “Paradise lies at the feet of your mothers”. And again in Islam the prayer of a child over its dead parent is considered extremely import for the departed soul. And much more.
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CONCLUSION
It is necessary for adherents of African Traditional Religion and their leaders to put the blame of their loss where it belongs. They should actually realise and understand that although continental Africa is comprised of over 60% Muslims and about 30% Christians, by default, the majority of Africans are also followers of the fitra (natural pure belief) of Adam, Eve and Abraham.
Again although about 80% of South Africans profess various types of Christianity, the followers of the indigenised African Traditional Christian Churches have remained, to a great extent, loyal to the same fitra (natural pure belief) of Adam, Eve and Abraham.
We therefore kindly request religious, traditional, business and political leaders, including the general public, to reject and take action against statements that contradict Clause 15 (1) of the South African Constitution that declares “Everyone has the right to freedom of conscience, religion, thought, belief and opinion” and the Bill of Rights that “Enshrines the rights of all people in our country and affirms the democratic values of human dignity, equality and freedom.”
Such actions also contradict the African [Banjul] Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights adopted in June 27, 1981 by the African States members of the Organization of African Unity. The Article 8 declares, “Freedom of conscience, the profession and free practice of religion shall be guaranteed. No one may,
40 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat subject to law and order, be submitted to measures restricting the exercise of these freedoms”.
Again, the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights, Adopted and Issued in Cairo on 5 August 1990 during the Nineteenth conference of the Member States of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) declares in Article 1a that; “All human beings form one family whose members are united by their subordination to Allah and descent from Adam. All men are equal in terms of basic human dignity and basic obligations and responsibilities, without any discrimination on the basis of race, colour, language, belief, sex, religion, political affiliation, social status or other considerations. The true religion is the guarantee for enhancing such dignity along the path to human integrity.”
In this instance, since there is an attempt at undermining the rights of the minority South African Muslim community, despite provisions to uphold these in the country’s much-vaunted Constitution, it would be wise and correct for South African Muslims to seek the protection of the Commission for the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities, whose mission, vision and operations are aimed at protecting the rights of cultural, religious and linguistic communities. Hopefully it will use its investigative and conflict resolution roles to stem such possible future outbursts.
There is also the need to invoke the favourable consideration of the South African Council for the Protection and Promotion of Religious Rights and Freedoms and all its religious and civil organisations who are signatories of the South African Charter of Religious Rights and Freedoms (SACRRF) that defines the
41 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat religious freedoms, rights and responsibilities of South African citizens.
Again the collective of indigenous, minority, migrant and diaspora South African Muslims need to make an urgent representation supported by an extensive report on xenophobic and other such attacks against Muslims to the South African Human Rights Commission plus the United Nations’ Forum for Minority Affairs, the United Nation’s office of the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion, the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation, plus the United Nations Forum for Minority Affairs in Geneva Switzerland.
These efforts should also include cordial discussions with traditional authorities and the Congress of Traditional Leaders (Contralesa) across the country, since Muslims in rural areas remain the most vulnerable.
How do we then allow the ways of the noble sons and daughters of Africa to be publicly berated in such a lowly fashion? We have always known our kings and chiefs to play the role of nation building while accepting all their subjects without bias or discrimination.
There is no doubt that the present day South Africa is a beacon of peace and hope for the world because it has shown how former enemies can reconcile and build a nation from the ashes of war and hopelessness. Let us continue holding that torch of peace and hope, by constantly reminding each other that none of us is better than the other and that we all come from One God and will eventually return to Him.
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I also have my fears, that his attempt to find a common ground with fellow Africans may boomerang on my face because I am speaking to power and power has no race. I am reminded that it is common that when straight talking African leaders and thinkers attempt to address urgent matters, they always hit a hard wall of resistance or face ridicule from others. Perhaps the December 6, 1961 death of Frantz Fanon in Washington DC, USA, while seeking leukaemia treatment “in that country of lynchers” (in his words according to Homi K. Bhabha in his foreword of Fanon’s book “The Wretched of the Earth”), is a metaphor we can use to show how incapacitating this is…..
Having spent his life fighting and writing against European and American colonialism, Fanon had no option but to seek the enemy’s assistance in his last hour. The debate and conjecture still continues about whether the enemy dealt him the last blow leading to his untimely death or not. The same can be said about Yasser Arafat and many others. Homi K. Bhabha further wrote, “Fanon was advised that his only chance of survival lay in seeking the leukemia treatment available at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Accompanied by a CIA case officer provided by the American Embassy in Tunis, Fanon flew to Washington…” Although Fanon had earlier advised Jean-Paul Sartre that “A colonized person must constantly be aware of his image, jealously protect his position”
Fanon’s intuitive intelligence while healthy permitted him to guard the survival of his body and spirit, yet when death was near, those closest to him advised him to abandon his beliefs and reach out to the colonial masters for assistance.
Is that not the case with many African intellectuals and thinkers who find themselves alone and abandoned by the very people
43 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat they had spent their lives fighting for? We hope and pray the same does not happen with us who dare stand up to articulate truth. Only the truth. m not writing this to condemn, but to remind, the critics of Chief Zwelivelile Mandla Mandela’s conversion to Islam, about where indigenous Africans come from, that African Traditional Religion, Judaism, Christianity and Islam are closely intertwined with the history, cultures and traditions of the African people. It is also a reminder that Mandela is not the first African chief to embrace Islam and that the history of Islam is also intractably linked with past and present chiefs and their people who profess Islam across the length and breadth of the African continent.
When I read those negative media statements, they reminded me of my personal journey of over 40 years as an Azanian Muslim. I have always been maligned by some members of the community including, family and friends, who erroneously claimed I have abandoned my culture and traditions; of having crossed the line by becoming “Indian and Arabic”, and of adopting a foreign religion and much more.
It also reminded me of Apartheid days when its security apparatus harassed indigenous Muslims and threatened them under the 1950 Suppression of Communism Act, that not only proscribed the Communist Party of South Africa but created a series of offences under an extremely broad and vague definition of "communism”. Action against those offences included harassment, torture, death, loss of possessions, jail time and being exiled.
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While dealing with state discriminating based on race, religion and culture, Apartheid also limited and restricted our personal and public movements by aligning African Muslim activists with communists.
This matter made me realise how easy it may be for us to regress back to the past days of suppression and repression without even realising it; that it is our joint responsibilities to remind each other in kind words and wisdom that this country and continent is big enough for all of us together.
I thought it may help us all to acknowledge that Muslims are normal people; that Muslims may be your neighbours; that there may be Muslims in your own families; that there may be Muslims in your political parties; that your shopkeeper may be a Muslim; that your subordinate may be a Muslim; that your leader may be a Muslim.
Muslims are everywhere; therefore please accept them as part of mankind. All that we Muslims request from you is to allow us to practice our faith freely without being restricted like during colonial and apartheid days.
I thank you.
Malik Arafat
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Appendix 1.
Mandla Mandela's conversion to Islam sparks South Africa 'disquiet' www.bbc.co.uk/news/world/africa
10 February 2016 From the section Africa
Image copyright AFP Image caption Mandla Mandela is chief of Mvezo, Nelson Mandela's ancestral home
Traditional leaders in South Africa have expressed "disquiet" over chief Mandla Mandela's conversion to Islam.
The Congress of Traditional Leaders in South Africa (Contralesa) told the BBC that being Muslim could affect his ability to uphold Xhosa traditions.
Mandla Mandela, who converted to Islam late last year, got married in a Cape Town mosque last week.
He inherited his position as chief of Mvezo in the AbaThembu clan from his grandfather, Nelson Mandela.
He is believed to have converted in order to marry Rabia Clarke, a Muslim.
This is the fourth marriage of Mr Mandela, 42.
Africa Live: BBC news updates
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Contralesa's spokesperson Chief Mwelo Nonkonyane said Mr Mandela's new religious affiliation could present a conflict for his subjects.
"There is nothing wrong with a traditional leader following any faith he chooses but we are concerned about whether he will be able to continue performing his responsibilities as a chief," he said.
Traditional chiefs sometimes lead thanksgiving rituals for ancestors, which would include presenting slaughtered animals to them in prayer.
Such practices are not considered to be in line with the beliefs of many Muslims.
Analysis: Pumza Fihlani, BBC News, Johannesburg
Chief Mandla Mandela may find himself at a crossroads - forced to choose between his new bride and his loyal subjects.
Nelson Mandela's heir, who prides himself on being a man of tradition, may face some tough questions over his decision to convert to Islam.
The conversion has implications for him not because of the religion itself but because it creates uncertainty about the chief's loyalties.
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And it seems the secrecy has caused concerns within the AbaThembu Royal family, who now question the chief's commitment to upholding time-honoured traditions.
In rural South Africa, away from many of the trappings of modern life, traditional leaders play a key role in their communities.
This could be in the form of ceremonies or day to day decisions on how to resolve conflicts. While this is the chief's fourth marriage, it is the first to pit him against tradition - the very core of who he is.
Mr Nonkonyane says Mr Mandela has already gone against traditional by assuming his wife's culture.
"According to African tradition, it is the woman that must become part of the family she is marrying into. When she accepted Mandla's proposal, the expectation was for her to adopt the ways of his people," he said.
He married Ms Clarke in a ceremony that was not attended by members of the royal family, leading to reports they were not happy with the union.
Mandla Mandela's wives:
Married Tando Mabunu-Mandela in 2004. They are reportedly still entangled in a bitter divorce
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Wed Anais Grimaud, from Reunion, in a traditional ceremony in 2010. Marriage annulled after reports that she had an affair with his younger brother Married Mbali Makhathini in 2014. Marriage annulled by court after first wife opened charges of bigamy Wed Rabia Clarke in a Cape Town mosque in 2016 after converting to Islam
Source: South Africa's Times newspaper
But Mr Mandela seems content with his decision.
"Although Rabia and I were raised in different cultural and religious traditions, our coming together reflects what we have in common: We are South Africans," he is quoted as saying at the ceremony.
Mr Mandela is also an MP with the governing African National Congress.
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Appendix 2.
Media Statement by the Muslim Council of South Africa (Mucosa). 01 March 2016
TOPIC: Islam under attack in South Africa
The Muslim Council of South Africa (Mucosa) in conjunction with South African Muslims wishes to express its dismay and disappointment at the way the conversion of former President Nelson Mandela’s grandson chief of AbaThembu in Mvezo, Inkosi Mandla Mandela and his subsequent marriage to a Muslim lady, Rabia Clarke.
Recent media statements and commentaries by the Council of Traditional Leaders of South Africa (Contralesa) and the Director of Icamagu Heritage Institute, Dr Nokuzola Mndende have saddened indigenous South African Muslims who feel their choice of belief is under attack. Those statements have in the main been very biased, dangerous and misleading to the people of this country.
Mucosa President, Nceba Salamntu says, “What is worrying is that those statements have the possibility of promoting religious and racial intolerance in the country”.
All those events happen in the backdrop of the unfortunate June 2015 brutal killing of Zaytuna Mlambo and the fatal stabbing of her brother Hashim Mlambo, in the Inchanga area of the Kwa- Zulu Natal Province, by a family member apparently opposed to their conversion to Islam.
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“Such statements may agitate attacks against indigenous Muslims like what happened to foreign national Muslims in the previous xenophobic countrywide attacks in the past few years”, says Salamntu.
The Muslim Council of South Africa (Mucosa) in conjunction with South African Muslims calls on the Council of Traditional Leaders of South Africa (Contralesa) and the Director of Icamagu Heritage Institute, Dr Nokuzola Mndende to publicly withdraw those misleading statements.
“We also call on the South African government, Religious Leaders, Civic Leaders and all peace loving citizens of this country to join us in condemning any attempt to create division and strife between peoples of South Africa”, says Salamntu.
He also adds that, “Any attack on Islam and Muslims is also an attack on followers of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Traditional Beliefs, Buddhism and other belief systems”.
This statement is issued by Nceba Salamntu, President of the Muslim Council of South Africa (Mucosa).
Ends.
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52 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat
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53 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version FREE TO BE MUSLIM – DEFENDING MANDLA MANDELA Malik Arafat
54 of 54 | Free Copy – E-Book Version