Malawian Muslims who are anxiously looking forward to see Islamic learning centres using a universal syllabus should forget about it for now as the responsible committee for the formation of the document says it has no fund towards the project.
Last year Islamic organisations that run Islamic learning centres in the country met in Zomba with an aim of ensuring that Muslim children in Malawi are following the same syllabus regardless of location and learning centre.
Muslims across the southern African state welcomed the initiative saying it will ease the challenges children have been facing in acquiring religious studies. For years, children who have been moving from one madrassa to another have been finding it hard to acquire the religious studies since most Islamic centres uses different course outline.
Chairperson for the National Islamic Syllabus Committee (NISC) Sheikh Abdul-Rahman Kalako has meanwhile described the development as unfortunate.
“The committee has been very keen to see to it that the syllabus is put in place as quickly as possible, but with the unavailability of funds, it puts the prospects of having the first ever Islamic syllabus in jeopardy,” he said.
Since its establishment, the committee has managed to formulate programmes for classes one and two only.
In addition, it is remaining with a task to formulate the other two remaining classes (three and four) since it was only mandated to produce documents for lower classes only.
The formulated document is understood to be in draft form as the committee lacks resources to produce copies that will be given to responsible organisations for scrutiny and subsequent approval.
Sheikh Kalako who also heads Dawa department at a Zomba based Al Nidau Islamic Foundation, said the committee managed to produce the guidance for class one and two courtesy of the funds given by Al Baraka Charity Trust (ACT) and Al Nidau Islamic Foundation.
For the whole project to be completed the committee requires about five hundred thousand kwacha, the amount which cannot be diffuclt to source if Muslims in the country are really serious with the project.
The development comes days after Muslims saw a lot of millions of kwacha being squandered in organising the 2012 Ijitima which according to many participants was a waste of resources because it did not meet the intended purpose.
Despite spending such millions of Kwachas, participants complained that they did not get enough lectures and food as promised by the organising committee. They therefore suggested that it would have been beneficial if the funds would have been diverted to other important projects.
After the committee was established, the national chairperson of the Muslim Association of Malawi MAM said it will create a board that will be administering examinations in all Islamic learning centres once the syllabus has been formed.
Reporting by Ali Blessings Idi
Thank you very much for this article. It seems Muslims running organisations and coming up with projects lack knowledge of project management and other managerial skills. Firstly,how do you start implementing a project before raising the required funds to undertake the same project? Because as far as I know,when an organisation comes up with a project,there should even be a committee tasked to raise funds for the same project. Atleast not less than 50% of the required funds should be raised for the project to start.Secondly, what criteria do they use when coming up with members of this committees? I believe,knowing how to recite the Qur'an in Arabic should not be the criteria for one to be a member of these committees. Let people be selected for what services they will contribute to the committee. i.e. let project managers, accountants, business administrators be included in these committees because these will contribute their skills and knowledge in their fields to make sure that the projects succeed. But if every time we come up with projects we only select people because of how much they have in Islamic Theology, then am afraid,the chances of succeeding in those projects and committees are very slim.is time we accepted that secular education also really plays a role in our every day lives and the sooner we incorporate the services of the people who have specialised in these fields the better.Otherwise, this failures in our organisations will not go away and we will always be a laughing stock in our society.we will be looked at, as people who mostly fail to run simple projects even when people/donors are willing to fund some of our projects.
I pray that, Allah can give and open the hearts of our muslim leaders so that they can see value in each and every muslim who have acquired this knowledge and may Allah open the hearts of these leaders so that they can see the value of working as a team.O Allah,let our leaders learn the art of ants,who accomplish great things just because they believe in unity and team work.Let them include that boy/girl for as long as that boy/girl has something/skills/knowledge to contribute towards the achievement of the project at hand. You alone, Ya Allah, You are the best planner.
Allahuma ameen