Only If We Could Maintain This!

Islam is the predominant religion in The Gambia. Since majority of the people are Muslims, we are therefore at least expected to do things in common and in line with the teachings of Islam.
But what we have witnessed over the past years in this country was a total political influence in the sighting of the moon, thus commencement of Ramadan and when to observe the Eid prayers.
Many Gambian Muslims were the least happy with The Gambia Supreme Islamic Council for letting Muslims in this country down, by not being able to coordinate and handle religious issues the way it should be.
Politics is eating into their fabrics!
Unless the council turns over a new leaf, most Gambian Muslims would lose confidence in them.
In fact this is an open secret for all to see.
For example, last year, Muslims in the country did not begin the Ramadan collectively, thus leading to different dates of the Eid prayers in the country which, even if it was happening in the first republic, was not as rampant and problematic as it is today.  
For this year’s Koriteh prayers, even though people observed the feast on different days, there was not much hullabaloo. We at The Daily News are saying that only if we could maintain this, the lost glories of the council would be regained.
The country is a small one where the Supreme Islamic Council could coordinate religious issues reasonably.
We hope and pray that this trend would continue for the betterment of the Muslim Ummah.
This is what we want to see in The Gambia, when Muslims would fast and pray together in the spirit of peace.   
Politics has no room in Islam.  Politics is politics and Islam is Islam. This should be known to the council and the powers that be, as a matter of fact.
We hope the council would pick it up from here and start putting their house in order, come next year’s Ramadan.
And furthermore, we hope the powers that be would also pick it from here and allow Gambian Muslims to follow their religion with a free mind.
On this note, The Daily News would like to wish all our esteem customers, especially our advertisers and the public in particular, a blessed koriteh, belated though.