By Dr Shagufta Umar
The International Muslim Women Union (IMWU) was founded at a gathering of delegations from 70 countries in Sudan in 1996. Dr Kausar Firdous and Dr Samihya Raheel Qazi had participated in the maiden conference.
The Union has its headquarters in Sudan and the general secretary is also appointed from Sudan. The IMWU executive council ie the Council of Trustees has 32 members. Its meeting is held in any of the countries whereas General Congress is held after every three years in which Chairman Board of Trustees and persons in charge of the regions are elected.
Pakistan has the honour to host three annual conferences ie in 2003, 2013 and 2018. Mumtaz Md. Nawi, a member of the Union from the Malaysian state of Kelantan, offered to host the conference for 2019. This conference was held successfully from June 23 to 29, 2019. Nawi is also a minister of People Welfare, Family Development and Woman Affairs of Kelantan.
As many as 55 representatives from the countries including Sudan, Pakistan, Turkey, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Iraq, Malawi, Nigeria, Somalia, Cameroon, Togo, Ivory Coast, Uganda, Oman, Hong Kong and Korea participated in the conference. All delegates of the organisation have to arrange their complete travelling and staying expenses on their own. The conference was held in Kota Bharu, Kelantan, Malaysia.
The delegation from Pakistan included Chairperson of the Union Samihya Raheel Qazi, Secretary-General of Jamat-e-Islami Pakistan Durdana Siddiqui, In-charge of Department of Women and Family Dr Rukhsana Jabeen, In-charge of IMWU Asian region Dr Shagufta Umar, member of “Majlis-e-Aalimat” of the Union Dr Zaitoon Begum and In-charge of Youth Forum of the Union in Pakistan Ayesha Umar Marghoob.
The conference of the Council of Trustees of IMWU started on June 24, 2019. Secretary-General Dr Afaf Ahmed presented the report of the activities held under the headquarters.
Later, the reports of African and Asian regions were presented. I presented the reports of Pakistan, Kashmir and Sri Lanka as an Assistant Secretary-General of the Asian region.
Dr Asma Jamila from Uganda presented the report of the African region. Reports were also presented by the representatives from Malaysia, Indonesia, Turkey, Thailand, Iraq, Somalia, Nigeria and Uganda where activities are relatively stable. We came to know about the work in Cameroon, Togo and Ivory Coast also as activities there are in their initial stages.
The organisation is pretty stable in Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Lebanon, Sri Lanka and Kashmir but representatives couldn’t participate from those regions. Dr Zaitoon Begum presented the report of “Majlis-e-Aalimat”, Dr Rukhsana Jabeen presented about participating in Women Conference held under United Nations and Ayesha Marghoob presented report of IMWU Youth Forum Pakistan. Durdana Siddiqui presented suggestions, recommendations and the line of action for the future. There was a discussion in the second session for analysing the difficulties of the branches and about the future planning.
Two more detailed discussions took place on June 26 and 28 subsequently.
A conference was held under the International Young Muslimah Forum (Al-YOUM) for female students in an adjacent hall on June 24 which has a topic of “Syedna Khadijatul-Kubra as a practical model”. More than 500 female students participated in the conference.
There was a representation by young female debaters from Malaysia including Palestine and Hong Kong whereas Ayesha Marghoob represented Pakistan.
A dinner was arranged by the wife of the chief minister of the state, notables of the city besides foreign delegates were present in this simple but elegant dinner. There was also an arrangement of local cultural shows at this event.
A conference was held under Muslim International Summit Kelantan (MISK) on June 25 with the title of “Research and Compilation Conference”. As many as 78 theses were obtained a month before and then published in the form of three books in three languages ie English, Arabic and Malay. This was an extraordinary and commendable piece of work. I also presented a thesis titled “Persons beyond gender and homosexual behaviour”. The conference was held in three sessions.
A tour to the assembly of the state of Kelantan was organised on the evening of June 25. The Speaker of Kelantan welcomed the delegation and described the policies of Kelantan which included: A riba-free economy, ban on liquor, arrangement for hijab, arrangement of education and training of men as “qawwam” (protector, maintainers), the establishment of centres for financial independence of women and other issues.
Steps are being taken to present Sahaba (male Companions of the holy prophet) and Shabaiyat (women companions of the holy prophet) as role models for the young generation and these events are also a part of this campaign.
A wonderful conference was held on June 25 which was the central programme of these events regarding Khadijatul Kubra. Notables, dignitaries and scholars from all over the state were present at the event. The chief minister of the state was the chief guest and other officials along with their wives were also present at the conference. This programme was a manifestation of equality and unity among leaders, activists and volunteers.
There was a large contribution of almost 300 active, well-mannered and helpful volunteers to make these events successful and they delivered very well in their respective fields.
Mumtaz Md. Nawi, the host of events, made a detailed speech about statistics, boundaries and future plans in the state regarding women after the starting words. This speech was made in their national language but a facility of translation was available for foreign delegations. Women were conferred upon awards for their best performance in different fields and Dr Samihya Raheel Qazi was also one of them.
The second session the next day consisted of speeches and questions and answers from the foreign delegates.
The last day in Kota Bharu was reserved for a city tour. We went to an industrial home established in the state for women and its work was appreciable. There was an effective marketing strategy in place. There are 150 such institutions working on the government level in this one state.
On the final day in Kota Bharu, conferences of officials of IMWU continued until late at night. All the important steps to be decided by the next year meeting including planning for the sub-branches attempts to solve the problems and suggestions for organising the meeting of Council of Trustees in 2020 came under consideration. Conclusions made in these events would become a source of protection of Muslim women rights of the Islamic world as per boundaries according to the Islamic teachings In Sha Allah, so the Muslim families would become a source of spreading positive behaviour in every society and establishing peace and stability.
