MUSLIM YOUTH 2040 VISION

Muslim Youth Society (MYS) has disclosed that it has a blueprint to transform the Muslim community and Malawi at large by 2040 through various sectors of development.

In an interview with MYS Public Relations Officer, Allie Ahmad Dickson, said the organisation has outlined some
activities that will make its 2040 vision accomplished.

“We first researched what lacks in our Muslim community and we found that there are a lot of things but some of them were lack of vision and dependency syndrome which made the Muslim community to lag behind in terms of development,” said Dickson.

He said MYS is advocating for mindset change, hence adventuring in organizing people to coordinate and manage
issues pertaining to Islam.

“We have introduced areas of focus in our Vision 2040 which are education, health and nutrition, agriculture,
economy and infrastructure.

“We need to uplift education standards in both Islamic studies and secular education. The initiatives are aimed at
complementing government efforts,” Dickson emphasized.

Dickson said as a way of contributing towards national development through education, MYS has opened secondary
school classes in Mzuzu which have about 40 students on a part time basis.

On top of that it has also a library which will be officially launched soon and an ICT centre that will be accessed by all
people for their educational needs.

Commenting on the matter, Sheikh Abdul-Hakim Ntenje said the youth are the driving force in any development
agenda; hence the need for them to strategize in the development of the deen.

“It’s very commendable, if the youth are doing like this, Muslims livelihood will gradually improve and develop,” said
Ntenje.

Ntenje agreed with Dickson that Muslims need to change their mindset and focus in benefiting issues that were neglected in the past.

He mentioned the issue of having schools offering secular education as a strategy to achieve the vision.

“For so many decades, we have been focusing on Islamic education which is not wrong but we did not do well in secular education that’s why our children are going through some challenges to attend school ranging from discriminatory tendencies from some quarters and fees,” said Ntenje.

He adds, “Having an Islamic University will help a lot of Muslim students to attain high level of education instead of
paying bursary for the students at other religious) universities or international universities.”

Ntenje therefore asked leaders and other stakeholders to support the Muslim youth in changing the mind set saying
this will give meaningful development to the Muslim community.

“Let’s support what is good, and this is a good move by the youth and we have to be on their back,” said Ntenje.

MYS started in 2016 but its operations began in 2019.