Zaid Ebrahim
General Secretary, AMJ South Africa
Jamaat Ahmadiyya Cape Town, South Africa held a successful Peace Symposium in Khayelitsha on Saturday 30 June 2018.
Khayelitsha is a sub-economical suburb of Cape Town, situated about 25 kilometers away from the Jamaat Headquarters in Athlone.
The Theme of the Symposium was, “Unity in Diversity: A Journey Towards Peace”, and it was held at the Hopolang Primary School, which is about 100 meters away from our Jamaat Centre in Khayelitsha.
It was well attended by members from various cultural and religious groups, including men, women and children.
The program consisted of recitation of the Holy Quran with the Xhosa and English translation.
The Reverend Roux Malan of the Unitarian Community offered a devotional prayer. This was followed by the opening address by Jamaat Ahmadiyya National Sadr and Missionary In-charge, Mansoor Ahmad Zahid Sahib along with the opening silent prayer.
AMJ South Africa
The first guest speaker was Father Matsepane Marore of the Roman Catholic Community. His speech dealt with unity in what we are, and what we become.
We were honoured by the presence of Councillor Albert Ntsodo, Cape Town Mayoral Committee member, who represented the Honourable Madam Mayor, Alderman Patricia de Lille of Cape Town at our Symposium. In his Mayoral Message, Councillor Ntsodo expressed his happiness that in the harsh and corrupted times we are living, there are people who will come together, to talk about love and peace, and to find solutions to bring about love and peace. His speech mainly dealt with love and peace, and that God has created us as one common human race, and this is what we have to strive for.
The third speaker was Comrade Kama Mesuli, African National Congress (ANC) Youth League Leader. With reference to the theme, Comrade Mesuli said that unity in diversity must be a unity with purpose. Quoting Mother Theresa, he said that there are things we can do and there are things we cannot do; therefore we need to take hands to help one another to achieve what we could not do before.
The fourth speaker was Apostle Lorraine Moko from the House Ministries International. This was followed by the fifth speaker, Rayaan Allom Sahib of Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya.
Before the closing remarks by Mr James Ellman from Faith Hope Love Communities, Mansoor Ahmad Zahid Sahib presented gifts to all speakers.
We were also honoured by the local Sunni Imam of the Harare Mosque, Sheikh Nazeem, who graciously accepted our invitation to attend. He also offered a few closing remarks in the Xhosa language and a prayer. The Symposium ended by offering everyone soup and bread.