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GOD’S TRUTH: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND History of Muslims in NZ Continues .. The first Muslim family to settle permanently in New Zealand arrived in April 1854, within 15 years of the Treaty of Waitangi. Wuzerah and Mindia, and their sons, came from India and settled in Canterbury to work for Sir John Cracroft Wilson (1808-1881), a retired Anglo-Indian civil servant. The family settled in Cashmere and later worked in transporting stone for the famous Christchurch cathedral. Wuzerah’s son Piro drowned in 1862 and is believed From the 1890s onward men from the Punjab and Gujarat regions of India started arriving and after the 1930s some of these men or their sons began to bring out wives and children. In 1950 the “New Zealand Muslim Association” (NZMA) was established in Auckland as the first Islamic organisation in this land. There were approximately 200 Muslims in the country at the time. In 1951 the MS Goya brought dozens of Muslim refugees from eastern Europe to Wellington. In 1954 Avdo Musovich (1919-2001) from Montenegro jumped ship in Auckland and claimed political asylum. He became involved in the NZMA Executive Committee until 1981. In 1959 Akif Keskin (1923-1991) from Macedonia established the first Turkish restaurant in all New Zealand, in Dunedin. That year the NZMA acquired a property for use as an Islamic Centre in central Auckland and the following year Maulana Ahmed Said Musa Patel (1937-2009) arrived from the Gujarat to be the first trained Mullah Over 1962-1964 the Wellington-based “International Muslim Association of New Zealand” (IMAN) was created and in 1977 the “Muslim Association of Canterbury”. In the 1960s Abbas Ali and Hajji Mohammed Hussain Sahib, both from Fiji, secured employment at freezing works and undertook the first commercial Halal slaughter of animals. Over the 1960s and 1970s there was an influx of east European, Asian and Fiji Indian migrants, refugees and students who made various contributions to the different Associations. In 1969 the first Tablighi Jama’at visited New Zealand and they have been staging regular annual Ijtema gatherings since 1976. In 1979 there were around 2000 Muslims across all New Zealand and representatives of the various Muslim Associations met to create a national Muslim organisation to co-ordinate minority affairs, especially with regard to the Halal meat issue. In April 1979 the “Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand” (FIANZ) was formed with Kosova-born Albanian refugee turned businessman Mazhar Krasniqi as inaugural president. He was immediately From the 1980s to the present period there has been a steady increase in the number of Muslim immigrants, refugees and students from Asia, the Middle East and Africa. There has also been a corresponding increase in the size, scope and number of Muslim organisations, agencies and institutions, especially in Auckland. The Islamic Education and Dawah Trust was created in 1990 and currently operates the Al Madinah School and Al Zayed Girls College in Mangere, Auckland. In January 2008 the growing Shia minority held their first Ashura commemoration programme in Auckland, led by the Fatima Zahra Charitable Association. In the final analysis the flag of Islam has been flying peacefully in the Land of New Zeal for over 170 years. The one consistent feature of the Muslim minority in New Zealand is the fact that it is made up of several overlapping, interactive and evolving communities. This diverse community is not a monolith. Progress has been achieved in every field through prayer, piety, For further information, see: Published in 2018 – 9th Edition
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History continues ..
STANDING ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS : A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2015 – 6th E A Brief History of NZ Muslims – 2016 – 7th E BELIEVERS TO THE BRIGHT COAST: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2017 – 8th E GOD’S TRUTH: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2018 – 9th E THE TABLE SPREAD: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2019 – 10th E THE HEIGHTS: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2020 – 11th E COUNTRY MATTERS: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2021 – 12th E MATCHINGS SCARS: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2022 – 13th E SOMETHING ELSE: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE MUSLIMS OF NEW ZEALAND – 2023 – 14th E |