Islam
is a minority religion in South Africa. Numbering around one
million, Muslims make up less than 2 per cent of the population
of 45 million. Around 90 percent of Muslims are termed
"Indian" and "Malay" Muslims. The former are
descendents of indentured and trader immigrants who arrived from
the Indian sub-continent from 1860; the latter's ancestors were
slaves imported from South and Southeast Asia from the 17th
century. Around 10 percent of Muslims are termed
"African," that is, individuals indigenous to Africa.
These
terms are, of course, problematic because people cannot be boxed
into biologically differentiated race groups to which we can
attribute specific features. However, in post-apartheid South
Africa, the census divides citizens into four racial categories:
White, Colored, Asian, and Black African. Malays are part of the
Colored group. These categories have been widely internalized by
most South Africans, are employed in everyday life, and are
therefore real social phenomena.
Statistics
do not reflect the qualitative experience of being Muslim.
Muslims are largely urbanized and live in racially segregated
suburbs and townships. The Adhan (call to prayer) is audible to
most Muslims, who have Muslim neighbors, and madrasahs are in
close proximity. Concentration has produced a sense of
population density that the census does not capture.
South
African Muslims are deeply divided by race, class,
ethnicity, language, politics, education, and beliefs. |
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The
fact that practicing Muslims turn towards Makkah in prayer does
not mean that they constitute a monolithic fabric. On the
contrary, they are deeply divided by race, class, ethnicity,
language, politics, education, and beliefs. Generally, average
per capita income is highest among Indian Muslims, followed by
Malays and then Africans. This reflects higher levels of
education and lower levels of unemployment.
Language
is another marker of differentiation. Over 90 percent of Indian
Muslims regard English as their first language. Among Colored
Muslims the divide is roughly equal between English and
Afrikaans. However, among Black Africans, indigenous languages
like isiZulu, isiXhosa, Sepedi, Setswana, and SiSwati are
represented.
For
much of the 20th century, Muslims were oppressed by the policies
of segregation and apartheid of successive White governments.
Institutionalized racism, job reservation, the migratory labor
system, separate amenities, and racially-biased social and
welfare services resulted in deep inequalities that manifested
themselves in racial terms. This had mixed consequences for
Indians and Malays. Residential clustering in racially based
Group Areas allowed Muslims to build mosques and madrasahs and
to practice Islam in a value-friendly environment.
Many
Muslims are retreating to an Islamic identity in their
private lives and constructing boundaries around various
points of contact. |
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Access
to education led to higher levels of literacy as many more
Indian and Malay children completed school and graduated from
the Universities of Western Cape (Coloreds) and University of
Durban-Westville (Indians). Mass education led to economic
mobility and was also critical in reshaping conceptions of self
and religion. As more Muslims had direct access to the printed
word, there was a shift from Islam being
"taken-for-granted" to being "explained" and
"understood." Younger, educated Muslims challenged
traditional conceptions of Islam at the same time that more
conservative interpretations of Islam became institutionalized.
The
Rainbow Nation
Apartheid
ended with the release of Nelson Mandela in February 1990, the
unbanning of political organizations, multi-party negotiations
and, ultimately, South Africa's first democratically elected
government on April 27, 1994. The new nonracial democracy did
not support an Islamic worldview; on the contrary, the African
National Congress (ANC) government legalized abortion,
prostitution, pornography, and so on. Together with the
government's affirmative action policy and African Renaissance
agenda, and the impact of globalization, these dramatic social,
political, and economic changes have triggered significant
behavioral changes among large numbers of Muslims.
The
Western Cape witnessed an assertion of "Malayness."
This must be viewed in the context of the "rainbow
nation" concept put forward by Nelson Mandela, which
encouraged people to seek their own identities. Some Muslims
condemned this reinvention of a Southeast Asian identity.
Academic Shamil Jeppie felt that "if representatives of the
new-found ethnicity, with its wealthy connections, contribute to
the type of isolation, insularity and belligerent communalism
rampant elsewhere in the world, they ought to be scorned and
rejected by South Africa and its Muslim population."
The
Cape was also the site of political radicalism in the name of
Islam when community leaders formed "People Against
Gangsterism and Drugs" (Pagad) in May 1996 to fight the
scourge of drugs and gangsterism. Pagad drew on elements in
Islamic religious sources — without regard to historic context
— that emphasized the believer's imperative to oppose
indecency and crime through direct action to achieve a just and
morally correct society. Those who refused to do so or
criticized Pagad were branded hypocrites (munafiqun).
Pagad gained the support of Muslims by embracing Islamic
slogans, dress, and rhetoric, with additional community support
created by extensive use of the newly democratized airwaves in
the form of Radio 786.
 |
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Thousands
of Muslims in Pretoria, Cape Town, and Durban protested against
the anti-Prophet cartoons (photo by Ebrahim Mohamed).
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The
rise of Pagad seriously challenged the fledgling nonracial
democracy. Violence reached dangerous levels as gang members
reacted through a systematic program of killing Muslim
businessmen and professionals, while petrol bombs were hurled at
several mosques. Pagad altered the textures of social life and
civil society in the Western Cape. While it forced the state to
address the problems, its tactics destabilized civil society.
Police were ambivalent when Pagad killings involved gang members
only, but took the threat seriously when restaurants and police
stations in white Cape Town were bombed from 1998. From the
beginning of 2000, the police focused on destroying Pagad by
arresting key leaders. In this way the movement was neutered
within two years.
Turning
to the Core
Among
Indian Muslims, many have begun "turning to the core":
Many more women have begun to veil their face; there has been
greater concern with observing religious regulations concerning
food; the numbers of Muslims going annually to Saudi Arabia for
pilgrimage has increased dramatically; televisions sets have
been rooted out from many Muslim homes; there is a
de-Westernization of dress; many men have taken to wearing Arab
garb, short hair, shaved moustache, and long beards; many have
given up insurance and medical aid, and have turned to Islamic
banks; Islamic media has flourished (radios, newspapers, and a
television channel); and there is a dramatic growth in Muslim
and Islamic schools. Theological debate is virtually absent as
"truth" has become with the ulama. To question
ulama means questioning the truth.
Another
conspicuous feature of the new Islam is self-reformation,
whereby individuals are becoming attached to sheikhs (spiritual
mentors). Many Muslims are retreating to an Islamic identity in
their private lives and constructing boundaries around various
points of contact: between men and women, Muslims and
non-Muslims, Muslims and the state, Islam and secularism, and so
on. In introducing new and tighter Islamic codes in the public
and private domains, Muslims are using the new freedoms of a
secular state to redefine the kind of Muslims they want to be.
Animosity
to the State?
While
inward-looking, Muslims are using the constitution to realize
specific needs and rights. For example, Muslim lobbying led to
the government setting up the South African Law Commission (SALC)
project committee in 1999 — headed by Supreme Court Judge
Mohamed Navsa — to draft a bill on Islamic marriages. This has
not been resolved because of different interpretations of
Islamic law among Muslims.
This
irresolution does not imply animosity to the state on the part
of the majority of Muslims, nor is there a serious and
systematic proselytizing aspect to it. While many Muslim
intellectuals and professionals are concerned about the new
conservatism, this pattern seems unlikely to change as long as
the ulama continue to shape the traditions and beliefs of the
majority.
While
the first African Muslims arrived in Natal from Zanzibar in
1872, their numbers remained small until the past few decades.
The spread of Islam in the Western Cape gained momentum in the
1960s with the pioneering work of Imam Abdullah Haron, who broke
the law by entering African townships for da`wah work.
Elsewhere Africans embraced Islam mainly as a result of
individual acts or the efforts of Sheikh Ahmed Deedat's Islamic
Propagation Centre International (IPCI).
There
is a strong perception among Africans that Islam is an
exclusively Indian religion, and Africans who embrace
Islam are seen to be "colonized" by Indians. |
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This
is in contrast to North, West, and Central Africa where Arab
traders played a crucial role in establishing Islam. Indian
traders in Natal mostly remained isolated from Africans. In
fact, Islam has historically been viewed by Africans as an
"Indian religion," and an exploitative one at that
because of its close association with Indian traders. There is a
strong perception among Africans that Islam is an exclusively
Indian religion, and Africans who embrace Islam are seen to be
"colonized" by Indians. Since the 1990s the numbers of
African Muslims have been augmented by the arrival of Muslim
refugees from Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Angola, Malawi, and other
African countries.
Tensions
have surfaced between African and non-African Muslims. African
Muslim leaders differentiate between "historically
imported" and "historically indigenous" Muslims.
It irks many Africans that while their needs are not attended
to, local Muslims react swiftly by providing cash, food, and
medical supplies to Muslim victims of natural calamities and
warfare in other parts of the world. African Muslims wonder why
the Muslim gaze is not directed towards them with the same
intensity.
Much
work needs to be done by Indians and Malays to bridge the racial
divide and put an end to the idea that Islam is the religion of
rich "foreigners" who drive expensive cars, live in
beautiful mansions, spend excessively on lavish mosques, and
care little about African Muslims. Younger African Muslims
stress the need to chart an independent course whereby Islam is
in concert with the socio-cultural experience of African
Muslims.
The
Wider Muslim Causes
South
Africa's Muslims are not immune from international events.
Although most Muslim organizations condemned the attacks on the
World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, local Muslims were
castigated in many quarters. There were abusive calls to the
Cape Town-based Muslim Judicial Council (MJC), followed by an
arson attack on its offices. Most South African ulama have
denounced suicide bombings. Speaking on the popular Channel
Islam, Mufti A.K. Hoosen said that given that suicide was
prohibited in Islam, and that the Prophet had cautioned his
followers to avoid killing the old, women, and children during
conflict, or destroying property, suicide bombings were not
permitted, except in Palestine which is considered a "war
zone."
Muslims
also condemned the US-led invasions of Afghanistan in October
2001 and Iraq in March 2003, and took part in large-scale
demonstrations in support of the Palestinians, led by the
Palestinian Solidarity Committee (PSC). The PSC placed emphasis
on inter-faith support as it argued that the struggle was one
for land and human rights rather than a religious
Muslim-versus-Jew conflict. The South African Communist Party (SACP),
Cosatu, as well as NGOs like the Anti-Privatization Forum,
participated in pro-Palestinian protests. In February 2006,
thousands of Muslims joined in marches in Pretoria, Cape Town,
and Durban as part of international protests against the
controversial cartoons of Prophet Muhammad in the Danish
newspaper Jyllands-Posten. Many are also boycotting
Danish goods and a local newspaper, Sunday Times, that
challenged Muslims who were seeking a court order prohibiting
publication of the cartoons.
Between
Integration and Isolation
 |
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Ebrahim
Rassool, premier of the Western Cape
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Conservative
ulama generally discourage Muslims from participating in street
marches. Organizations like the Jamiats of KZN and Gauteng
attribute Muslim weaknesses to the "spiritual
shortcomings" of Muslims themselves, rather than Western
military and technological superiority. Their message is that
Muslims will regain lost ground when individual Muslims perfect
their Islamic practices. They urge prayer and self-purification
instead of public protest that involves the mixing of the sexes.
Generally,
while many Muslims are seeking to implement Shari`ah, there is
no attempt to create a counterpower. Organized Muslim bodies are
largely compliant because the state interferes little in the way
Muslims practice Islam. Notwithstanding this, some observers
continue to speak of an "Islamic threat" in South
Africa. Journalist Max Du Preez made unsubstantiated allegations
of Muslim complicity in the attack on the Israeli-run Paradise
Mombasa Hotel in Kenya on November 27, 2002, and questioned the
loyalty of South African Muslims to the state. Martin Schonteich
of the Institute of Security Studies told the Crime Writers'
Club in Pretoria in February 2003 that there was "rising
fundamentalist sympathy in the Muslim community … with even
traditionally moderate Muslim leaders becoming increasingly
outspoken." As a result of developments in the
"radical" face of Islam, letters to editors and
call-in programs portray Muslims negatively. They are seen as
intolerant, opposed to democracy and human rights, closed to new
ideas, and as zealots easily given to violence. These views
reflect the impact of daily reports of conflict involving
Muslims throughout the world.
Most
Muslims, for their part, have participated actively in South
Africa's non-racial government, shunning the view among a
minority that they could not embrace the broader democratic
movement because political cooperation with non-Muslims was
un-Islamic. The majority of ulama, intellectuals, and community
leaders have been urging Muslims to participate in democratic
elections. Many, in fact, have directly counseled Muslims to
vote for the ruling African National Congress. The Africa Muslim
Party (1994) and Africa Moral Party (1999) failed to gain
representation in Parliament. The (formerly white) National
Party and subsequently the Democratic Alliance have largely
failed to exploit the fears of Muslim minorities that
affirmative action and high crime rates were destroying the
country.
Some
Muslim activists, however, have expressed misgivings about
supporting the ANC uncritically. They consider it unselfish for
Muslims to base their political judgment purely on the fact they
are not discriminated against because of their religion and on
neo-liberal economic policies that have allowed many businessmen
to flourish. They believe that Muslims should consider the fact
that little has been done to alleviate the plight of the masses.
There are also concerns about the government's plan to open an
embassy in Iraq and collusion with foreign governments that has
led to the mysterious disappearance of Khalid Mahmood Rashid and
others suspected of supporting the Taliban or Al-Qaeda. It is
rumored that Rashid, who was detained in October 2005, is
languishing in an American prison.
Muslims
have been prominent in government. Muslim ministers have
included Kader Asmal (Water Affairs), Valli Moosa (Environment),
Abdullah Omar (Justice), and Naledi Pandor (Education). Aziz
Pahad is deputy minister of foreign affairs, Essop Pahad is a
special advisor to President Thabo Mbeki; Ebrahim Rassool is
premier of the Western Cape; while Justice Ismail Mohammed
occupied the most senior legal position in the country until his
death. Muslims generally express satisfaction that South Africa
is one of the "safest" for Muslims post-9/11 and
acknowledge that South Africa has largely taken an independent
line on world affairs. One indication of the general contentment
of affluent Muslims in South Africa is that interest in
immigrating to Western countries like the United States ,
Canada, and the United Kingdom has virtually come to a halt.
Select
Bibliography
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Bradlow,
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Bhana,
S. "Indianness Reconfigured, 1944-1960: The Natal
Indian Congress in South Africa", Comparative
Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, XVII,
2, 1997:100-107.
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Bhana,
S. Gandhi's Legacy. The Natal Indian Congress, 1894-1994.
Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 1997.
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Da
Costa, Yusuf. "Assimilatory Processes amongst the Cape
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