Political reformation in Sri Lankan Muslim community...!

People are immersed in political debates and arguments today in Sri Lanka. Muslim community is not exempted from this. Indeed, Muslim community in Sri Lanka is more keen and eager in politics than any other communities. Politics is the talk of the town today. They speak about politics in all occasions.  Muslim people are politically awaken today than ever before in Sri Lanka. This is good and yet, who dominate politics today. Do Muslim community or Muslim public really benefit from our politicians? Do Muslim politicians deliver their service to their community and to their nation?  Do they have charismatic leadership qualities to make a difference to our community today? Do they have any vision to help Muslim community in this Multi-ethnic country? What are the quality and qualifications of our politicians today?  Today like all other subjects politics also dramatically changed. Muslim community should select and elect some of best brains in Muslim community to lead Muslims in politics in Sri Lanka. 

Unfortunately, political leadership of Muslim community went to some wrong hands since the time of four righteously guided Caliph. We have seen the consequences of this in Muslim history and even today we see this Muslim land. We could see some good politics in non-Muslim land, take for instance politics in Europe or some other Asian countries and politics in Muslim lands. We have a chaotic politics in Muslim land. Same like that today in our local Sri Lankan politics too we have some useless Muslim politicians. We have to send them home in this general election. In the past, in Sri Lanka we have had some good Muslim politicians yet, and today we do not have any charismatic political leadership among Muslim community in Sri Lanka. Now it is once again election seasons so Muslim community should think seriously on this issue and select some of the best candidates in Muslim community. 

  We are living in non-Muslim community among Sinhalese and Tamil. In our parliament most of the members are non-Muslim and we are minority in this parliament. We have nearly 20 members in parliament. These members should be highly qualified people to represent Muslim community. They should have skills, talents and abilities to grasp national politics, national issues and Muslim problems. They should have profound insight to understand Muslim problems in the context of Sri Lankan politics with majority of non-Muslims in parliament. We have seen this lack of insight in recent time among Muslim politicians. When BBS unleashed attacks on Muslim community they could not do anything about it. They did not have any influence to make a difference on this issue. This means these so called our politicians in parliament today are not competent enough to serve. They could not influence the ruling party to take any meaningful action or they could not work with opposition to work out some strategies to counter BBS.  They keep waiting and waiting until divine intervention comes to protect Muslim community. Do we want to keep these useless politicians in power? 

In the past, Muslim politicians have made great contributions in Sri Lankan politics. In the post and pre- Independence Sri Lanka they made some great contributions for the unity and integrity of Sri Lanka. This contribution is greatly acknowledged and recognised even today by some Sinhalese community. To name a few, the names of Sithee Lebbe, TB Jaya, Sir Razik, Badiudeen Mahmood, ACS Hameed, and Asharaff. These personalities rendered the communal and political service with dedication and devotion. They worked for the community with sincerity and good intention and yet, today our political leadership has been a burden to our community. Rather than they look after the national or communal interest in Sri Lanka today our politician use their prestige and position to make money and wealth out of politics. 

Politics is a trust and responsibility. Those who come to politics will be asked about their responsibilities on the day of judgement. Today we have many incompetent Muslim politicians in Sri Lanka. They do not do any good for Muslim community or this nation. I do not need to name them. Muslim community know them by name. Soon we will have a general election. It is high time now to think about this and forward some good names for Muslim politics. We should not be heedless on this. It is a collective duty of Muslim community. It is very much similar to many other collective religious duties or obligation. Otherwise all crook people will come into politics. All what they care about is only their personal interest. We know how some of Muslim politicians use their posts to make fortunes at the expense of communal interest. 

For instance, compare the contributions of B.Mahmood or ACS Hameed to that of our politicians today. Today our politicians care only about their families not about our community. As a result of this community does not benefit from them at all. Because of these ineptitude politicians Muslim community do not benefit from so called development projects and employment opportunities we have today. 

 It is imperative we discuss this issue of Muslim political leadership at this time. This is a timely needed discussion. At this juncture Muslim professionals, intellectuals, academic, Islamic scholars should have some discussions and proposed some good ideas how to select our political leaders. This can be done at local or regional level. I understand this is a very demanding and difficult task given the fragmented nature of our community on different political and ideological groups and sects. Yet, if we do not choose some of the honest, vibrant and clear brains into politics Muslim community will collectively pay a big price for their bad choice.  Muslim of our political leaders are out of touch from Muslim community. They do not know what are the needs of Muslim community? They are too old to know the problems of Muslim community or they do not have mind set to serve Muslim community today. Therefore it is imperative to change this old system of politics among Muslim community today in Sri Lanka.  I just want to provoke your thought on this issue. I know this is a difficult task to do in our community yet no harm in discussing this. That is why I wrote this this to make some awareness on this issue.