Banafunzi

Hatimi Camp - Saadia Sheekh Haredo lost her speech and the use of her legs due to mental shock

Somalia, The Death Sentence of Barawa: The Genocide [of 1991]

Banafunzi 3 months ago No Comments

A city south of Mogadishu devastated, the inhabitants, guilty of affinity ethnic groups with the dictator Siad Bare, massacred, and subjugated. Poisoned fruit of the war of all against all, which gives four years shakes the country, the ordeal of Barawa is continuing, without anyone noticing. In Africa we have many Sarajevo, but already conquered, ethnically cleansed and subjugated. Several cities in Somalia, in four years of civil war, ended up this way without the United Nations lifting a finger. It happened in Barawa, where I was born, a city with a thousand years of history, the oldest bastion of

Abubakar Salim Abu Deera (1936-2018) – Discovering Famous Bravanese Poets

Banafunzi 6 months ago No Comments

Abubakar Salim (1936-2018) (also known as “Abu Deera”) was a 20-21st century poet born and raised in the City of Barawa, Somalia. He became popular in poetry and shtenzi (Bravanese form of poetry) at an early age where he was requested to recite some poetry in a gathering in Jamaame and Jilib (towns in South Somalia). One of his most well-known poem was the poetic lament he wrote dedicated to the 1991 Somali Civil War, where he was able to decipher the pain and agony of what his community went through duing that period as he was one of the

Sheikh Ahmed Haji (died 1900)

Banafunzi 11 months ago 3 Comments

Sheikh Ahmed bin Haji was a Banadiri scholar in the late 19th century, he rose to prominence based on his defiance and long resistance against Italian Colonial rule and also being a religious reformer. Biography Sheikh Ahmed bin Haji Mahdi bin Amin bin Aweis [better known as Shaikh Ahmed Haji al-Fadili] was born in Hamar presumably in the third decade of the nineteenth century where he received all his education there, he was one of the distinguished students of Sheikh Abu bakr bin Mihdār, who was known as Shaikh al-Mashaikh (Shaikh of all Shaikhs). One of his colleagues in education

Sheikh Uways Muhammad al Barawi al Qadiri (1847-1909)

Banafunzi 11 months ago No Comments

East African Pan-Islamic revival owes much debt to the struggles of the Qadiri leader Shaykh Uways bin Muhammad al-Baraawi. Sheikh Uways was another famous scholar that was born in Barawa, as a young teenager, he studied theological science and philosophy. He later on went and studied with eminent scholars and learned Quran, Quranic exegesis, Syntax, and legal pinciples. He traveled to Baghdad, Makkah, Yemen, North Somalia, all in the pursuit of seeking knowledge. Upon his return to Barawa, he began missionary works throughout East Africa and gained large influence through his movement. Sheikh Uways’ influence can be felt throughout East

Sheikh Qassim Muhidin Al-Barawi (1878-1922)

Banafunzi 11 months ago No Comments

Sheikh Qassim al Barawi was born in Barawa from the Raa Waa’ili clan, he was famously known for the many Qasa’id (Religious Poems) he wrote. He was multilingual so wrote poems in both Arabic and Chimbalazi (Barawa language), and Somali, it is said that he was the first to write the standard Bravanese Language spoken today in the Arabic Grammar, it was written in an old Persian form before. He translated many Arabic writings in the Barawa Language for ease of access to knowledge, such as the Chimbalazi version of Al-Busiri’s “Hamziya”. Today his poems in arabic are published in

The Banadir Jurist and Scholar Shaykh Muhammad al-Maqdishawi (648/1250-718/1318)

Banafunzi 12 months ago 2 Comments

Some of the greatest mashā’ikh of Hadīth—such as Shams al-Dīn al-Dhahabī (673/1274–748/1348), Zayn al-Dīn al-‘Irāqī (725/1325–806/1404), Ibn Nāsir al-Dīn al-Dimishqī (777/1375–842/1438), Taqī al-Dīn al-Maqrīzī (764/1364–845/1442), Ibn Hajar al-‘Asqalanī (773/1372– 852/1449), Shams al-Dīn al-Sakhāwī (831/1428–902/1497), and many others—have been taught by Hadīth experts that hailed from the Banadir Coast. Al-Dhahabī mentions in his Greater Dictionary of Teachers ‘Mu‘jam al-Shuyūkh al-Kabīr’ one of his teachers in Hadith from Mogadishu by the name of Muhammad b. ‘Alī b. Abī Bakr, the Great Jurist, the scholar, Shams al-Dīn, al-Tamīmī, al-Maqdishāwī (الْمَقْدِشَاوِيُّ) al-Shāfi‘ī (648/1250–718/1318). Al-Maqdishāwī “transmitted hadith from al-Kamāl Ibn al-Dakhmīsī al-Hamawī (600/1204–671/1273), whom he

History of the Portuguese in Barawa

Banafunzi 1 year ago 1 Comment

This article will seek to explore the interactions between Portugal and Barawa in its historical context and the impact it left on the coast. Throughout the course of history, the Indian Ocean was a contested location in the maritime facet. The strategic location it sat on which connected Africa, Arabia, Persia and Asia resulted to this prolific trading route where trade was carried out abundantly. Coastal towns who sat on the Indian Ocean benefited from this immensely, this included Barawa, an Indian Ocean Town situated in the East African Coast. The seasonal pattern of the monsoon winds made it easy

The Historical Town of Barawa and its Earliest Inhabitants

Banafunzi 1 year ago No Comments

Written by Allesandra Vianelo Introduction Barawa is the southernmost of the Benadir ports, lying approximately 200 km. south of Mogadishu and 100 km. south of Merka. Despite these comparatively short distances, during the nineteenth century most travellers and traders reached the town by sea, as the land routes were not safe because of warfare among the Somali clans and common banditry. However, the port of Brava, although considered by Europeans the best – or the least perilous – of the Benadir harbours, was defective and did not offer a safe anchorage to large ships. Moreover, at the peak of the

What a German explorer wrote about Comorian Scholar Ahmad bin Sumayt

Banafunzi 2 years ago 2 Comments

He was three years old, when Otto Kerstan, a German explorer met his father, the Aboubakar ben Abdullah ben Suméit, in 1864 at Itsandra Mdjini (Ngazidja Comores). His father Aboubakar ben Sumeit is from Shiban city in Hadharmout (Yemen) and grandfather of Al Habib Omar ben Ahmed ben Aboubakar ben Sumeit. Here’s what the German explorer reports in a work published in Germany between 1869 and 1879: ′′Of all the people I know here [Itsandra Mdjini], the Honorable Sharif Said Abubakari ben Abdallah ben Sumeit was the most dear to me, we immediately established a friendly relationship. By the way,

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