islam in New Zealand

Information about islam in New Zealand

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 Islam in New Zealand has grown with inward immigration to that country.

History

The first Muslims in New Zealand were Chinese golddiggers working in the Dunstan gold fields of Otago in the 1870s. In the early 1900s three important Gujarati Muslim families came from India. The first Islamic organisation in New Zealand, the New Zealand Muslim Association (NZMA), was established in Auckland in 1950. In 1951 the refugee boat SS Goya brought over 60 Muslim men from eastern Europe, including Mazhar Krasniqi who would later serve twice as president of the New Zealand Muslim Association. These Gujarati and European immigrants worked together in the 1950s to buy a house and convert it into an Islamic Centre in 1959. The following year the first Imam arrived in New Zealand - Maulana Said Musa Patel from the Gujarat. Students from South Asia and South East Asia helped establish the other prayer rooms and Islamic centres elsewhere from the 1960s onwards, although New Zealand had a relatively tiny Muslim population until many years later.

In April 1979 Mazhar Krasniqi brought together the three regional Muslim organisations of Canterbury, Wellington and Auckland, to create the first and only national Islamic body - the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand (FIANZ). He was honoured for his efforts by the New Zealand government in 2002, receiving a Queens Service Medal. Later Dr Hajji Ashraf Choudhary would serve as president (1984-85) before pursuing his political career and entering New Zealand parliament in 1999.

Large-scale Muslim migration began in the 1970s with the migration of Fiji-Indians for work. This was exacerbated after the first Fiji coups of 1987. These were working class in the 1970s, followed by more professional social elements in the late 1980s. Early in the 1990s many migrants were admitted under New Zealands refugee quota, from war zones in Somalia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Kosovo and Iraq.

There are also small communities of Muslims from Turkey, the Indian Subcontinent (Pakistan, India and Bangladesh) and South-East Asia, all of which communities are concentrated in the major cities of Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, and Christchurch. In recent years an influx of foreign students from Malaysia and Singapore has increased the proportion of Muslims in some other centres, notably the university city of Dunedin. Dunedin's Al-Huda mosque is reputedly the world's southernmost, and is further from Mecca than any mosque in the Southern Hemisphere.

There is a small but growing amount of conversions among the wider New Zealand population, and there is a Māori Muslim movement called the "Aotearoa Maori Muslim Association" (AMMA) with roots in the Hawkes Bay province. The 2001 census revealed 700 Māori registered as Muslim by faith and 3000 European.

Contemporary Islam in New Zealand

New Zealand now has a number of mosques in the major centres, and two Islamic schools (Al Madinah and Zayed College for Girls). New arrivals at Auckland International Airport can easily sight the new South Auckland mosque on the left of the motorway as they travel to the city. There are approximately 25,000 Muslims in New Zealand although it is hard to get accurate figures as the government is more concerned with "ethnicity" and Muslims come from at least 42 different ethnic groups. The community is noted for its harmonious relations with the wider New Zealand community, with various interfaith efforts from all sides contributing to this situation. This was strained somewhat after a speech by nationalist politician Winston Peters who during the 2005 election campaign described the New Zealand Muslim community as a "multi headed hydra, waiting to strike" and questioned their loyalty to New Zealand.[1]

The Muslim Students and Youth Association Of New Zealand. (MSYANZ)

The Muslim Students and Youth Association of NZ was formed in 1997. It is affliated to Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand (FIANZ). It is primarily run by students at Universities and Youth in the Community. They undertake regular activities like Islam Awareness Week (IAW), Sports Tournaments and organize Muslim Youth camps.

Cartoon Controversy

In 2006, two newspapers in New Zealand decided to republish the Danish cartoons. The Muslim community registered their displeasure through press statements and a small peaceful march in Auckland. The editors said they did not mean offence but would not back down. New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark and opposition leader Don Brash both made similar statements that the cartoons were not appreciated if they deeply offended members of the NZ community, but that such decisions were for editors to make, not politicians. Muslim leaders and the editors got together with the race relations office, and Jewish and Christian representatives in Wellington. As a result of this meeting the editors said they would not apologise but in good faith would refrain from publishing the offending images again. The New Zealand Muslim leadership, through FIANZ, then proceeded in good faith to consider the matter closed and furthermore draft letters to 52 Muslim countries asking that NZ products not be boycotted.

See also

Notes

1. ^ New Zealand First: The End Of Tolerance, an address by Rt Hon Winston Peters to members of Far North Grey Power, Thursday 28 July 2005, Far North Community Centre, Kaitaia, 2pm.
  • Drury, Abdullah, Islam in New Zealand: The First Mosque (Christchurch, 2007) ISBN 978-0-473-12249-2

External links

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Islam in Oceania
Australasia Australia Norfolk Island Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands New Zealand
Melanesia East Timor Fiji Indonesia1 New Caledonia Papua New Guinea Solomon Islands Vanuatu
Micronesia Guam Kiribati Marshall Islands Northern Mariana Islands Federated States of Micronesia Nauru Palau
Polynesia American Samoa Cook Islands French Polynesia Niue Pitcairn Samoa Tokelau Tonga Tuvalu Wallis and Futuna
1 Transcontinental country
Muslims by country.

Important note: Population counts by religious affiliation, like most demographic characteristics of a population, are based upon statistical science and subject to observational error and are technically referred to as estimates.
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Islam in Africa
Region Total Population Muslims % Muslim % of Muslim total
Central Africa 83,121,055 12,582,592 15.138% 0.852%
East Africa 193,741,900 66,381,242 34.263% 4.497%
North Africa 202,151,323 180,082,076 89.083% 12.
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Islam, the religion of almost all of the Algerian people, pervades most aspects of life. The vast majority of citizens are Sunni Muslims.
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Islam in Angola is a minority religion with 1 to 2.5% of the population identifying as Muslim. The Association of the Development of Islam in Angola is the primary proselytizing organization. Muslim Angolans are represented by the Supreme Council of Angolan Muslims of Luanda.
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Islam was brought to Benin from the north by Arab, Hausa, and Songhai-Dendi traders. Benin's Muslim population is concentrated in the north of the country, though extends as far souh as Djougou and even into traditionally Yoruba areas.
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Islam in Botswana is not well established and is only 2-3 percent of the population. Of those 2-3 percent, the vast majority are from the Indian subcontinent. Several Muslim agencies in Botswana have publicly expressed concern about Islamophobia in the local media, but its
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Islam in Burkina Faso (Upper Volta) has a long and varied history. As of today, the population of the country is 55 percent Muslim, representing about 7,658,922 individuals.
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Muslims in Burundi are officially around 1% of the total population, though Muslim Burundians estimate the figure to be closer to 8-10%. The CIA World Factbook also puts the figure at 10%. [https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/by.
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Muslims comprise roughly 16 percent of Cameroon's 13.1 million inhabitants. The Fulani, a pastoral nomadic group, spread Islam in early 19th century West Africa largely through commercial activity and Sufi brotherhoods (Qadiri and Tijani).
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According to the U.S. State Department International Religious Freedom Report 2006, there is a small Muslim community in Cape Verde. [1]

Notes

1. ^ www.state.

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Islam accounts for approximately 15% of the population of the Central African Republic, making it the second most followed organized religion in the country after Christianity (50%).
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The earliest Islamic presence in Chad can be traced back to the legendary Uqba ibn Nafi, whose descendants can be found settled in the Lake Chad region to this day.[1].
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According to the 2006 estimate by the U.S. Department of State, roughly 98% of the population in the Comoros are Muslim. Islam and its institutions have helped to integrate Comorian society and provide identification with a world beyond the islands' shores.
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Islam in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is not a recent phenomenon, as it has been present within the area since the 18th century, when Arab traders from East Africa pushed into the interior for slave-trading purposes.
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Islam spread to the Republic of the Congo from North Africa in the mid-19th century. [1] There is a growing Muslim community in the country, estimated at 2 percent of the population. In 2005 a large new mosque was constructed in Brazzaville.
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Islam in Djibouti has a long history, first appearing in East Africa during the lifetime of Muhammad. Today, 96 percent of Djibouti's 490,000 people are Sunni Muslims adhering largely to the Shafi legal tradition.
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Egypt is a republic with Islam as the state religion. Over 80% of Egyptians are Sunni Muslims[1], many of whom follow local Sufi orders, and a small number are Shi'a.
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Islam comprised less than 1 percent of the population of Equatorial Guinea.[1] Adherents.com, however, estimates that Muslims make up anywhere from 1% to 25% of the population.[2]

Notes

1. ^ State.gov
2.

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Islam in Eritrea is well established and accounts for approximately half of the religious population. The vast majority of non-Muslims in Eritrea are Orthodox Christians, they follow the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahdo Church.
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Approximately 12% of the population of Gabon practice Islam (of which 80 to 90 percent are foreigners).

Islamic, Catholic, and Protestant denominations operate primary and secondary schools in Gabon.
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Islam is the majority religion of The Gambia, with around 90% of the population being Muslims. However, some popular religions practices diverge from mainstream Islam, with a system of marabout societies being very common.
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The spread of Islam into West Africa, beginning with ancient Ghana in the ninth century, was mainly the result of the commercial activities of North African Muslims. The empires of both Mali and Songhai that followed ancient Ghana in the Western Sudan adopted the religion.
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2005 official statistics for Islam in Guinea estimate that 85% of Guinea's 7.8 million people are Muslim. Most are Sunnis who follow the Maliki legal tradition and Qadiri and Tijani Sufi orders. Although the French established a colony in 1891, their control of the region was weak.
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Islam is the predominate religion of Guinea-Bissau, numbering an estimated 38-45% of the roughly 1.4 million nationals as followers making it the largest religion of the country.
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Islam is the religion of approximately 10% of the Kenyan population, or approximately 3.4 million people[https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ke.html#People]. The Kenyan coast is mostly populated by Muslims.
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According to Adherents , the Muslim population of Lesotho in 2000 was 1000 or 0.05% of the population.[1]

Notes

1. ^ http://www.adherents.com/adhloc/Wh_184.

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Islam in Liberia is widespread, with an estimated 20% of Liberians professing the religion. The vast majority of Liberian Muslims are Sunni, with only a few Lebanese being Shi'ites. The Ahmadiyya, whom most orthodox Muslims consider heretical, are also slightly represented.
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Most Libyans adhere to the Sunni branch of Islam, which provides both a spiritual guide for individuals and a keystone for government policy.
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Islam has been well-established in what is now known as Madagascar for centuries and today Muslims represent 7% of the population, or approximately 1.2 million Malagasy.

History

Settlement of Arabs


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