Tunisia Speech in the Conference: “The Muslim Youth… Pioneers of Real Change”

Alertness of the Muslim Youth a Pioneer for Change

(Translated)

All praise belongs to Allah the Lord of the Worlds, and prayers and peace be upon the Chosen Noble Prophet and upon his family, companions and those who follow him in excellence until the Day of Judgment. Our Lord, forgive our sins, grant us relief from our trials, secure our worries and make us from your purified and sincere slaves; those who do not transgress or oppress. My Lord, open my breast, make easy my affair, loosen the knot from my tongue and make my speech intelligible.

My honourable sisters, I greet you with the greeting of Islaam, As-Salaamu Alaikunna Wa Rahmatullahi Wa Barakaatuhu, may your gathering and meeting together be blessed and I direct my gratitude to everyone who has responded to the invitation and everyone who has taken part to make this meeting a success…

The youth represent a manifestation for energy and creativity, a heading for giving and spontaneity. However, the youth suffer today from a painful and tragic reality, poor guardianship and marginalization, and from the absence of representation of their aspirations as Muslim youth who hope to restore o their sovereignty, usurped land and regain plundered resources.

The colonialist has worked for what is nearly a century to westernise the Muslim youth, to make him doubt his convictions and his identity. And the colonialist destroyed the Khilafah "Caliphate" and chose a select group to educate and raise upon the western concepts. They then utilised them to strike at Islam and to call for the liberation from the entirety of concepts that the Ummah had been raised and educated upon. This is in addition to submitting to the idea that development and progress will never happen unless the entire intellectual Islamic heritage is attacked and followed by chasing after western civilisation with all of its components. And so the youth became confused with these poisoned thoughts that set his instincts loose and made his criteria the attainment of benefit whilst removing the Islamic Aqeedah for the basis of his thought. This caused instability within the personality of the Muslim youth where his emotions would be stimulated by the reverberating slogans, such as freedom amongst others, and produced personalities that were not harmonious. Then the incumbent regimes were separated from all responsibility by claiming that these personalities were the natural result of physiological changes that they called the adolescent or teenage years. They carry the blame for their intellectual failure upon this age group and their thoughts, which have produced misery and frustration.

And this is not strange for the one who has wagered upon striking the Islamic Ummah in order to generate for himself a position amongst the nations. It is not strange for desperate efforts to be made to realise his objective. Here is a selected statement that reflects the colonialists’ intentions: “A cup and a beautiful girl work together to bring down the Ummah of Muhammad more than what a thousand cannons could accomplish”. And so they submerged it in the love of material possessions and desires.

And when the West felt assured in respect to the governments that they had installed upon the necks of the Muslims who were carrying their agendas, they were pleased with the accommodations (provided to them) to marginalise the youth within the corrupt educational organisational structure, the worn economics structure and failing subservient political structure. The youth then found themselves in a state of suffering not knowing how to remove themselves from it.

Meanwhile, from amongst the Shabab there is an innovative group that the colonialists are pleased to allow to emigrate to their homelands and put to them to work within their laboratories. We will present some statistics as a small example of this reality. According to the Arab League, 50% of doctors and 23% of engineers from the total Arab territories head to Europe whilst 54% of those who go there to study do not return to their lands. And from a state report about emigration in the year 2012, 57 thousand students from Tunisia emigrated to foreign lands whilst the return rate did not exceed 10%. The number of workers emigrating from Tunisia amounted to 83,529, while it was also mentioned in a report by the Department of Housing and Emigration policies in the Arab University that the Arabs lose $1.57 Billion annually as a result of the emigration of minds or brains.

And from the youth are those who find themselves caught between the quagmire of unemployment, delinquency and emigration only to escape from one tragic reality to fall into another that is even worse. That is because the West adopted its policy of providing shelter and expulsion in accordance to its need.

On a Maghribi level (i.e. Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia), the youth make up approximately half of the population. The majority of them are outside the work market and most are not married and dependant upon their fathers to manage their life’s needs. And it is strange that in every region there is a ministry called ‘The Ministry of Youth’ but what isn’t strange is that they have not brought any benefit, and that is because it is typical for them to provide an image that has no real worth.

As for the educational institutions, they represent an open space to imprint the youth with their values and provisions. They openly work to guarantee the reproduction of the same symbolic figures that serves the interests of the influential within the society and the colonialists and their lackeys in particular. The educational content specified in the programmes and curriculums are unhesitatingly replicated even though there are calls for reform, as they revolve fundamentally around cosmetic changes in respect to timings, school space and adopted mechanisms.

So in Tunisia, for example, they claim that they are reforming education whilst they spend their efforts and money to dispatch activities and cultural clubs, in accordance to their pretence. But what culture are they being surrounded with? Games that are called magical and dancing to clamorous music devoid of the simplest manifestations of shame and uprightness which should have been the most important value to be observed and anchored within the culture of the one growing up. How can they take responsibility for the educational programmes when it has not been permitted for them? Indeed, they are waiting for an adjustment from those who have employed them.

Within this disastrous situation for the youth, the associations and organisations have pushed forward with recruitment, calling for the Shabab/youth to be an essential and effective component in the reform process as they call it. Assisted systematically by the media out of fear that a radical and correct change will take place upon the hands of the sincere sons of the Ummah.

Added to these are the foreign associations that work under the heading “Leaders of the future” in which they draw in the youth and inculcate them with the western culture utilising enticing styles. They search for those who possess leadership qualities so as to involve them in suspicious situations and then bargain with them until they become voices for them and pawns in their hands.

Within this reality, there have been many studies that continue to count the causes for the marginalization of the youth and their decaying values. However, they missed the mark when they propose it is due to the breakup of families, or to lack of knowledge, or being shut off or his material circumstances. All the explanations they have mentioned are not reasons or causes but rather they represent the consequential suffering. The root cause is the Western authority over them which utilises local tools manifested in consecutive agent governments that follow the West’s command and implements its schemes.

However, even if they attempt to westernise them, they are nevertheless Muslim youth whose viewpoint emanates from their Aqeedah. So in statistical polls conducted by the Magharabi forum, from the total youth sample of individuals 79% agreed with the obligation of applying the Sharee’ah as a system of life whilst those supporting the Shar’i women’s dress were 95%.

The youth revolution in Tunisia is the best evidence to prove their awakening. It was a revolution that shocked the colonialist and its cronies, scattered its papers and confused their plans. It would have spread through the Islamic world had it not been for the agents helping the West to distract them and divert its path.

So how can the youth be pioneers for change as they had been in the era of the Messenger of Allah (saw)? The Islamic history is full of examples that live on forever in respect to the youth supporting their vital issues and participating in the building of the State. So just as the task of leading the army was given to the youth, the gravity of it in terms of responsibility, and the leadership of prayer, the writing down of the Revelation and the authority of judiciary, should all be sought with them so that they will be today like they were in the past. The Messenger (saw) said: «أوصيكم بالشباب خيراً، فإنهم أرق أفئدة.. لقد بعثني الله بالحنيفية السمحة.. فحالفني الشباب وخالفني الشيوخ»“I recommend to treat the youth well. They are the sleeplessness of the hearts… Allah has indeed sent me with Al-Haneefiyah As-Samhah… And so the youth allied with mean and the elderly opposed me”.

And he (saw): «سبعة يظلهم الله في ظله يوم لا ظل إلا ظله إمام عادل، وشاب نشأ في عبادة الله...»“There are seven that are shaded in the shade of Allah on the day when there is no shade except His shade: A just Imaam, a youth raised in the worship of Allah…”. Therefore, it is necessary for the youth to be statesmen and not teenagers or adolescents as their age is to be regarded as one of reaching the age of maturity accompanied by a change of vitality and by an intellectual change. Whilst also considering this age to be representative of the beginning of responsibility and accountability in the case where the Islamic potency mixes with the power and potency of the age of youth to produce great leaders and pioneers for change.

And for the youth to be raised in the worship of Allah, the authority of the colonialist must be removed from the Muslims and that will not happen except by the fall of the regime that is dominant over them. It will not happen by changing faces with others or by changing articles in the constitution with other man-made articles like it. Rather it will only take place through the establishment of the rightly guided Khilafah "Caliphate" State (Caliphate) upon the path of the Prophethood in which its system emanates from the Ummah’s Aqeedah.

Allah (swt) said:

[نَحْنُ نَقُصُّ عَلَيْكَ نَبَأَهُم بِالْحَقِّ إِنَّهمْ فِتْيَةٌ آمَنُوا بِرَبِّهِمْ وَزِدْنَاهُمْ هدًى]

“It is We who relate to you, [O Muhammad], their story in truth. Indeed, they were youths who believed in their Lord, and We increased them in guidance” [Al-Kahf: 13]. Sadaqallahul-Azheem.

So do not incline towards those who oppress you and accuse you of incompetence, falling short and instability. Just as there were in the time of those who came before you - men who built the glory of the Ummah and its civilisation, and safeguarded the Deen, the land and the honour, you too are mighty in respect to your Deen and to your Ummah, enlightened by your Aqeedah, responding to your Da’wah and working for the resumption of the Islamic life, that will rectify the situation of the people and please their Lord.