Museveni commends Muslims for successful community milestones

President Museveni has applauded the Muslim community for achieving remarkable success in the respective fields of their faith and education sector.

Speaking at the inaugural Muslim Women Leaders Conference at Old Kampala Senior Secondary School on October 8, Museveni said he was happy with the simple efforts Muslim leaders have made, leading to long lasting results in communities.

“During Amin’s time, the people who were in charge had got money from Saudi-Arabia to build a mosque but had not done so. [Instead], they built a crooked structure which had a crooked tower. Now, the Muslim leaders kept telling me about the mosque until I talked to Muammar Gaddafi [former Libyan leader assassinated in 2011] and he agreed to build the mosque and the mosque is now here and the other structures that you heard the Mufti speaking about, the shops and so on,” Museveni observed.

“So, I am very happy that our simple efforts result into something permanent like this,” he added.

The idea of building the Gaddafi mosque, also knowns as the Uganda National Mosque, was embarked on [by former Ugandan President Idi Amin Dada] during the 1970s after the realisation that Anglican and Catholic communities had well established prayer homes compared to those in the Islamic faith.

The mosque situated at Old Kampala Hill was funded to completion by Gaddafi in the 2000s.

 “Then, you have King Fahad Plaza, in town there. Again, I talked to somebody. I think in Saudi Arabia…...how to support the Islamic University in Mbale and they gave me $7m [about Shs25 billion] which I used for building that King Fahad Plaza and that has been helping the University of Mbale,” President elaborated.

He added: “Now, the University [of Mbale] itself. Some of the people had rejected the idea of an Islamic university, I said why? They said that they were trying to make us an Islamic country. I said no, some of our people are Muslims, there is no harm in having something Islamic. I therefore gave Nkoma SS, a government school, to them and they started that university with that school. Now, these days, wherever I go, I find many people who have graduated from that university.”  

On his part, the Mufti of Uganda, Sheikh Shaban Ramadhan Mubajje praised women in the Islamic community for being involved in running the affairs of both their religion and country.

“Uganda Muslim Council was not [previously supporting women] to be in the public space…but, then we came to a realisation that the mothers of the nation have to be involved in the affairs of their religion and the works of their country because they are in suitable positions to mold or give or give peace in the future, so, when the Supreme Council put up an amended Constitution, it is why we are seeing the women here at the forefront [running affairs of their religion] and their country, as a whole,” he said.

Sheikh Mubajje encouraged the women to continuously give themselves towards studying Islamic religion and serving their country.

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