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Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Clerics Vs Young Guns: The Battle for the Soul of Garissa

We all know the importance of Ulamaa and religion in safeguarding morality in society. The usefulness of youthful zest and energy in bringing about change with vigor and exuberance is undeniable too. And when the these two important pillars of society clash, the fallout can turn out to be intractable and damaging in the long term. So I was quite apprehensive when news of a dust up between  the "shyukh" and a group of youth who had organized an eid related event at the Government Guest House with the goal of bringing together young Garissians to sensitize them about drug abuse, Khat addiction, educational tutorials,  and group discussions on politics and clanism reached me.

The event organized by YM Media in conjunction with G-Youth was supposed to highlight the talents of our youngsters with performance of short skits, drama, comedy etc. They obtained a written permit from the Government Guest House Caretaker and were promised security by the police.

I am not sure how the Sheikhs got wind of the event but they swiftly issued a fatwa terming the event contrary to Islam and moved to threaten the caretaker with unspecified consequences if he did not revoke the permit.
Now, I do not wish to make a judgement but I'm sure you realize where my sympathies lie in this David Vs Goliath battle.

I'll summarize by saying this, the Sheikhs  need to careful not to be used by pseudo-ulamaa only interested in turning them into mere inert resources for their diabolical schemes. Lets hope that while mouthing their sanctimonious platitudes such as "Power belongs to God," they'll realise the philosophy of Do-or-Die cannot guarantee who does and who dies. They must stop playing the all knowing God and stop trying to control every facet of our lives. If they really want to fight evil, their guns better be directed at clanism and its evils for its that which will truly determine the success of Garissa County in 2012 and beyond. 

8 comments:

  1. Hawa mashehe wanafaa kutafuta job. waacheni na mavijana.

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  2. The fact that they planed to hold their eid event at GG house, was something that is worth rejecting.if this youth were to bring any usefull change, they could have just at first place forgotten the idea of holding this important event at GGH. somebody was trying to open for them a wrong cage. how could they have avoided or escaped those crate of beer and disco party that are always part of any event at GG house. anyway that was my experience of GGH the last time i was in GSA. if it`s still like that, then sheikhs (our clerics) could be right, I suppose. and hence it could have been a paradox that such a rich event should have taken place at GGH.

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  3. Bullshit! this is blasphemous,KUFR kind of.this article should be deleted "They must stop playing the all knowing God"...we have respect for our ulmaa,not a bunch of idiot youth who don't want to listen to their shiekhs.alshabab is an example of such idiot youth and you can see their result.I am a fun of this blog but I will cease to be if the article is not withdrawn.we love Garissa but we love ISLAM more everybody should know that we cant just sit while someone not only abuses our ulmaa but worse our LORD!!! I never expected such words will be said by a garissian..it is simple please delete this article.

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  4. this article must be deleted!

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  5. Lets debate issues without bringing blasphemy and cheap theatrics in to the argument. I happen to agree with the author 100%. Respect goes two ways therefore youth and ulamma need to understand each other.

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  6. There is nothing plasphemous in this article. I guess the usage of the language there has thrown some guys off. The article is by and large decent

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  7. Well I think is not bad idea to have such events so long the Islam policy is taken care of.The idea of bringing youth together is really nice and that is fabulous.But one thing that might create alarm is the involvment of both boys and girls at the same venue and especially if the event is happening at night.The organisers shall go back to the drawing table and see how best they can organise accepted by Islamic Policy.

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  8. In as much as we want the youths to "develop", this cannot happen at the expence of moral decandence. what will hired musicians from nairobi tell us, that we see them as reole models?, the virtues of eid day cant be whitewashed in clubs, similar to what i saw in some places dubbed eid disco, mpaka che etc etc!!.
    While am against some select people who play tribal card at the same time religious leaders, but those who are sincere in the path of the Quran and the Sunnah MUST prevail, not a mundane class of people who are on payslips and whose agenda is to prove to their donors why they have to justify their huge perks which is un heard of among the thousands of isdle, jobless populance.

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