THE MINISTER OF JUSTICE AND CONSTITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT

THE HONOURABLE MR J.T. RADEBE MP.  PARLIAMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA.

FOR ATTENTION: MR J.A. DE LANGE

jdelange@justice.gov.za copy: jskosana@justice.gov.za; drudman@justice.co.za

COMMENT: SUPERIOR COURTS BILL 2010 (Deadline 30 June 2010)

The  Al JAMA-AH  Political Party takes this opportunity to congratulate you and wish you strength when you will soon introduce the “Superior Courts Bill” in the General Assembly of the Parliament of South Africa. We would like to take up your invitation to comment on the Bill. We  now bring to your attention our concern that no provision is made to include a SPECIALIST COURT to deal with justiciable matters relating to Muslim Personal Law (MPL) which will also give legal consequences to marriages conducted according to the tenets of the Muslim religion. Reference to such a need is made in the draft “Muslim Marriages  Bill (MMB)”  Chapter 5 which currently awaits cabinet approval. Your desire to present to Parliament an all exclusive Bill is well known and we ask you to correct this oversight.

The father of Islam  in South Africa Sheikh Yusuf  1626-1699 (ORDER OF THE COMPANIONS OF OR TAMBO IN GOLD) left a legacy over 300 years ago which we believe will be crowned by the granting of legal consequences for our marriages and other matters relating to Muslim Personal Law. This was also the dying wish to me  of former Minister of Justice The Honourable Dullah Omar – a wish which his comrade and friend our beloved former President  Nelson Mandela wanted to realize together in  their lifetime but prevented from achieving because of constitutional constraints. It is only now that the best legal minds in the country  has produced a Bill that has produced this landmark legislation that the wishes of Sheikh Yusuf, Dullah Omar and Nelson Mandela is within our reach. A paper by Sheikh  Dr. AK Tofffar captures these aspirations and challenges. The AL JAMA-AH Political Party call on you  Mr J.T. Radebe to take the brave step at this final stage perhaps against all precedent to make provision for a

MUSLIM PERSONAL LAW (MPL) MATTERS SPECIAL DIVISION IN THE SUPERIOR COURTS BILL.

No harm will be done if  this provision is made while the (MMB) is still under consideration or any other Bills related to MPL is legislated.  We will further  take the liberty to suggest changes to the Bill before the above deadline to accommodate this and trust that the  two (2) attachments  will be of  some help. considered.

A paper on Muslim Personal law MPL by Dr Sheikh AK Toffar referred to in the Comment.

Chapter 5 of the Muslim Marriages Bill referred to in the Comment

Membership must be paid by means of an SMS which costs R10 and the balance of R5 must be paid at meetings called for members to collect their  paid up membership cards.When you send the SMS the automated system will record your mobile number and post it to the membership register. You are required to send your name, home address, email address, id number using your mobile number as a reference. This will automatically update the membership register. Our contact details are on the website which includes  an email to info@aljama.co.za or a fax to 021-5314273 or post to 1A Forest Place Pinelands 7405.

SMS THE WORD aljama to 38198

SMS Costs R10 and will be used for the Political Party’s mentorship programme.

Party Leader Ganief Hendricks has announced the Aljama-ah Political Party’s plans to introduce more young blood as ward councilors to contest the May 2011 municipal elections in Metros and districts all over the country.

The Party is targeting young men and women in the age group 18 to 24. In this age group over 80% do not have decent jobs or are unemployed yet they constitute the “intellectual capital of the nation”, have enormous energy levels and creative skills. They want to build their own future and the Party wants to give them the best chance to cut their teeth in politics to achieve this.

The Party’s first round thinking is to reserve 1000 ward seats, recruit aspirant young politicians and train them in the art of campaigning and skill them up as ward councilors. They will also get good governance training and lectures on good morals. The Department of Labour will be approached for skills development funding and the treasury for the R1000 a month subsidy for youth jobs.

The Independent Electoral Commission does not provide funding to help Parties contest municipal elections so AL JAMA-AH has launched a novel R10 sms campaign to raise R1 million to pay for the election deposits and for their posters.

The training will be done by the Center for Political Mentorship based in Delft and which is headed up AL JAMA-AH’S Party Leader Ganief Hendricks who is a youth training and development expert and who got an award as a pioneer of the internet in 2002 for helping create new generation jobs in South Africa.

SMS aljama to 38198

SMS Costs R10 and will be used for the Political Party’s mentorship programme

AL JAMA-AH  POLITICAL PARTY

REPORT BACK AND  LAUNCH OF ITS

PLANNING COMMISSION

2010 – 2025

will take place at  its headquarters at the

AL NAJAAE Mosque Buck Road Lotus River off Klip Road, Grassy Park Cape Town.

“HERITAGE DAY” 9 SEPTEMBER 2010.

The Party was registered by the Independent Electoral Commission as a political Party on 12 June 2007. Its constitution put in place a National working Committee whose term of office expires in December 2012. The Party participated in the 2009 National and Provincial elections as well as two bye-elections in Mitchells Plain and Maneneberg before the elections and a bye election in Atlantis after the elections. The Party is now in a position to give a report back. This report back and round table conference will enable the Party to plan the road ahead for the next 15 years.

Like the government the Party has identified the need for a PLANNING COMMISSION to address the educational, social and economic malaise of the Muslim community. Today the Muslim community is demographically worst off than several other communities and this is expected to deteriorate in the future. There is a gap in many sectors of the Muslim community between the actual Islamic message and their habitual practices making them nominal Muslim.    The Muslim community needs a plan that will capture a vision for the future. The community needs a vision that unites them on where they see themselves in the next decade or two  and how they plan to get there. Before the launch of the Planning Commission the Party will call for nominations for commissioners to serve on this commission and experts in the fields of human resources, innovation, administrative support, project management specialists, researchers, policy analysts, economic advisors, business, technology experts, transport activists, health professionals to make their services available. Once the commission has been established and experts are in place public hearings will be held to rally more  public support.

This will be followed by a funding conference. It is expected that at the report back and  launch the Party will set dates for a Constitutional Assembly and its first National Congress which will elect a Party Leader and a NEC  before the term of office of the National Working Committee expires. The leadership will take office as from 1 January 2013  allowing for a smooth handover in terms of the Constitution. A decision will also be made to confirm the Party’s participation in the 2011 Municipal elections and the 2014 National, Provincial and Municipal elections as part of its strategy to get the Muslim community more active in the political life of the country.

All  thought leaders, experts and opinion leaders and community workers  and the general public are invited to attend and take part in our interactive and participative conference.  This conference will provide you with both expert and practical discussions on the latest developments regarding current political issues related to the Muslim community. Sessions will be structured as a mix of plenary sessions, panel discussions and short sessions focusing on specific complex issues.

OBJECTIVES FOR THE 2010 REPORT BACK AND PLANNING CONFERENCE

The theme for the 2010 conference: “Goals for the next decade and beyond“.  We believe that many Muslims and others who will attend the conference are in a position to make a positive contribution and to influence the way forward. The 2010 conference aims to provide a forum for the exchange and sharing of information that all in their fields require, and to encourage high level discussion and debate about the political developments taking place in our country and its impact on the Muslim community focusing on where it ought to be headed.

• A sectoral determination for Imams to put in place a front line for community spiritual upliftment and reform. This will provide for fair remuneration and benefits which will include a retirement fund.
• Dr Sheikh Abdul Kariem Toffar who completed a doctorate in Muslim Personal Law exploring the position that administrative matters, adjudication and dispute resolution  relating to MPL should remain in Muslim hands.
• An agency to provide for Aids orphans in South Africa to show Muslim compassion for all South Africans with an “orphan sadaka” of 1% of monthly salary to be paid on Eid ul Adha.

The revolution that the people wanted was not on the agenda of the ANC in 1960 in spite of the adoption of the Freedom charter five years earlier in Kliptown. People all over the country became impatient just like they are today. Robert Sobukwe prominent in the ANC broke from it on 6 April 1959 to start the revolution in South Africa the African people wanted hot on the heels of the promises made in the Freedom charter. One year later his PAC liberation movement brandished the flag of the new South Africa and planned to liberate the country and take over the benches of government on 6 April 1960. The revolution was launched on Monday 21 March 1960 and the first step was for African men to walk peacefully to the nearest police station and hand in their pass books which they had to carry on them all the time or be arrested. The British Indians fifty years earlier did the same under the influence of Mahatma Gandhi and Hadjie Ozier Ally of the Indian Congress Movement when British Indians in South Africa were required to carry a pass. If enough Indians did this their movements would not be restricted and they will have more freedom. However according to the plans of the PAC leaders if enough African men did this it would stop the country in its tracks in three weeks. While the first steps were taken and a letter against the pass laws from Robert Sobukwe presented to local police officers no revolution took place in spite of great optimism by PAC stalwarts. However the Prime Minister of South Africa Dr Hendrik Verwoerd was shot on 9 April 1960 in the head and chest by a white farmer but survived – three days after “Revolution Day” set for 6 April the first anniversary of the formation of the PAC.

The ALJAMA-AH political Party remembers with sadness the 69 Africans many shot in the back and died and 178 Africans who were injured in the march on a police station 50 years ago. The Party conveys its condolences to their relatives and fellow South Africans deeply hurt by what took place.

The domain name has subsequently been purchased by an another entity, and we would just like to inform you that any emails or articles related to an aljama-ah.co.za domain

is not associated with this website.

1 May 2009

In a May Day message to party stalwarts Party leader of AL JAMA-AH Ganief Hendricks repeated the party’s election manifesto promise of “full employment” and decent and more jobs for people with disabilities in South Africa and undertook to assist the ruling party achieve this. The party has already met with cadres close to President Zuma to place 1000 people with sensory and physical disabilities in sheltered employment. These employees will largely be cadres who were maimed in the wars against the apartheid regime. AL JAMA-AH will not be a finger pointing Party and will take up the offer to work together with the ANC.

The ANC however has lost its status as a liberation movement and on its way to become a liberation government it has now reached the status of a well run aid organization like the many we have all over the world. Fourteen million grants to children and poor people is no mean feat, but is that what we want. Meeting global demands and being a pawn in the ongoing Anglo-Boer cold war in South Africa it must still shake off the shame that it was handed power stopped I its tracks to go for “the final push” but achieved it with the little help of the international community and clever Afrikaners who are now five times richer than they were during apartheid. Now it is the turn of the English speaking South Africans under the Zuma government to get rich. They got him off the hook after his debacles. Zuma however earns some reward for preventing a civil war between Zulus and Xhosas and becoming President is what many people say the elders and ancestors want.

The ANC led liberation movement did not demand or get reparations for the harsh oppression during apartheid by the Nationalist Party and Big Business. BEEE is no substitute for reparations and radical transformation. So the poor were robbed of their spoils of war. Twenty percent of the spoils of war is not asking too much to give to the poor instead this went to cadres who are now multi millionaires. The 20 richest families in the country if they pay their reparations it will make a dent into the cycle of poverty we have. The Zuma administration will become a better Aid organization than the Thabo Mbeki regime.

AL JAMA-AH claims that according to its count 50000 votes were cast to support the Party’s call to share the shariah with Parliament and to ask lawmakers not to ignore shariah rules. It will pursue this vigorously at public hearings. At its inaugural conference that will take place before end of 2011 delegates will be asked to endorse a call for an Islamic state in South Africa, which according to the Party is not a pipedream for a country on the African continent. Quoting extensively from sources in a recent article by Adnan Rashid Ganief Hendricks went on to say that the Islamic system is the only system that carries the capacity of treating others with complete fairness. Under the Islamic system, Jews for example lived in harmony and peace for over one thousand years and so did many others …

“The Islamic system is the only system that carries the capacity of treating others with complete fairness. Under the Islamic system, Jews lived in harmony and peace for over one thousand years and some of the Jewish scholars/historians remember that era as the ‘Islamic Golden Age’. AL JAMA-AH will help herald in a golden age for South Africa.

“O you who believe! Stand out firmly for Allah as just witnesses; and let not the enmity and hatred of others make you avoid justice. Be just: that is nearer to piety; and fear Allah. Verily, Allah is well-acquainted with what you do.”

Al-Bukhari narrated that even the immediate followers of the Prophet (SA) exercised maximum care in regards to fulfilling the promises of protection made with the non-Muslim citizens:

“Omar bin Khattab [the 2nd Caliph] said on his death bed that whoever shall succeed me must fulfill the promises of Allah and his Messenger. Whatever treaty has been made with non-Muslims must be respected by my successor. He shall fight (if he has to) to protect them and he shall not put a burden upon them which they can not bear.”

Events leading up to the formation of the Party

CV of Party Leader Ganief Hendricks

Media Pack Manifesto 2009