County News
Repent and pray to Allah instead of setting up mosque committee in drought response
Presidential candidate Mohamed Abduba Dida (Courtesy)
NAIROBI—A presidential candidate in Kenya has faulted a fundraising drive in Nairobi for a relief fund kitty aimed at mitigating the drought in parts of Somalia.
Speaking at a Pumwani mosque, Mohamed Abduba Dida blasted at the drought committee set up at different mosques in Kenya’s Nairobi and parts of Somalia saying such measures goes against the teaching of Islam.
He argued that the religious leaders should have established link with their God and sought forgiveness.
”It is misleading to tell the Muslims to take part in the campaign without insisting on istiqfaar (repentance) because the power to end the drought belongs to Allah,” Dida told Kulan Post on the phone when we contacted the controversial presidential hopeful over comment he made at the Burahan Estate mosque after the midday prayer.
Speaking after the prayers, Dida told the congregation to turn to prayers and suspend the crowd-funding campaign while drawing a comparison between today’s situation in parts of Somalia and during the second caliphate in Madina in modern day Saudi Arabia where Omar Ibnu Khattab ordered the Muslims to turn to repentance to end the drought that was ravaging parts of the caliphate.
”That is the Islamic way of dealing with the drought, not like the Red Cross where we put up pictures of malnourished children and carcass to appeal for funds.
”How much of help and support can we accumulate until the people are out of this dire situation?” Dida asked.
He called on the religious leaders not to mislead the Muslims.
Somalia is one of three countries at risk of famine. Three consecutive years of drought have left two regions of Somalia—Bay and Bakool—on the brink of emergency.
Humanitarian workers and NGOs have issued repeated warnings. Save the Children chief executive, Kevin Watkins, said on a visit to Puntland this week that the scale of the suffering is even greater than at the equivalent stage in 2011, with deaths from cholera and acute diarrhoea rising sharply.
“Given the weight of evidence, the scale of suffering and the memory of 2011 the international community’s response to the crisis facing Somalia’s children is indefensible and unforgivable,” said Watkins, who called on aid donors to act urgently.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who arrived in Somalia on Tuesday on an emergency visit, said he was stunned by the rampant misery he witnessed.
“Every single person we have seen is a personal story of tremendous suffering. There is no way to describe it,” Guterres told reporters after visiting a cholera ward in Baidoa, a city northwest of Mogadishu.
As water sources have dried up, Somalis have been forced to drink water infected with the deadly cholera bacteria. Nearly 8,000 have been affected and more than 180 have died in the outbreak so far. The WHO reported that nearly 5.5 million people are at risk of cholera.
“It makes me feel extremely unhappy with the fact that in today’s world, with the … the richness that exists, that these things are still possible. It is unbelievable,” Guterres said.
