Thursday, July 9, 2009

sadness and sorrow

Assalamualaikum

July is the final month for me to be the president of IMU Muslim Society. This time, I will share my experience as a leader in a community comprising of tertiary level students. Like most of my colleagues, I was very surprised to know that I had been selected as the president. I had never ever liked to be a person controlling an organisation. And I had always thought that I definitely not qualified to do so. Plus this words of God:-

”Sesungguhnya Kami telah mengemukakan amanah kepada langit, bumi, dan gunung-gunung, maka semua enggan untuk memikul amanah itu dan mereka khuatir akan mengkhianatinya, dan dipikullah amanah itu oleh manusia. Sesungguhnya manusia itu amat zalim dan amat bodoh.” (Al-Ahzab: 72)

Yes, the ayaat does not tally with what I was facing, but that was enough to forbid me from taking extra duties. And here’s what Abu Bakr r.a. said when he was appointed as the imam (leader) by Rasulullah s.a.w., it’s in Malay as I don’t really feels like translating it.

“Aku telah kamu angkat sebagai pemimpin kamu padahal sebenarnya aku membencinya. Demi Allah, sesungguhnya aku berharap agar jawatan ini dipegang oleh salah seorang di antara kamu. Jika kamu membebani tugas kepadaku sebagaimana kepada Rasulullah s.a.w, maka aku tidak sanggup memikulnya kerana Rasulullah s.a.w seorang hamba yang diutamakan oleh Allah dengan wahyu dan dijamin keselamatannya. Sedangkan aku hanyalah manusia biasa yang tidak lebih baik daripada kamu. Maka bantulah aku dan taatilah aku jika aku di jalan yang benar. Tetapi jika aku menyimpang, maka luruskanlah aku.”

How can an average man like me happily carry the big responsibility when a great person like Abu Bakr tried to avoid it? They had always put on pressure on me to accept the post. I even tried not to talk to them just to avoid saying ‘Yes’ to their pleas. But then, I had accepted their offers, thinking that I won’t be burdened by too many responsibilities. And believing in what the seniors had said, being an MSOC committee member don’t affect my studies. Considering hadith of Rasulullah:

Rasulullah s.a.w bersabda yang maksudnya :”Ia (iaitu kepimpinan) adalah amanah dan di akhirat ia menjadi kehinaan dan penyesalan kecuali mereka yang mengambilnya dengan hak dan melaksanakan tanggungjawab yang diamanahkan di dalamnya.”
Riwayat Muslim

Accepting the post was not easy as we thought. I had been given a list of names, which only a few of them are my close friends from INTEC. Most of them were not known and I had to approach them, and I was expected to tell all of them that, they are chosen to be part of the committee members. First task already, although I was not officially announced as the president. But I did what they told me to do. Alhamdulillah, most of them agreed though I need to add a few more from my own batch and restructure the organisation.

Dissimulative attitude initially, then haunted by the feeling of guilt, followed by the urges to change myself. The chronological order of the stages of myself enduring period of being a leader, with the latter stage is the longest one. Reflecting myself, I tried to change myself to be a better person i.e. a more responsible leader. I tried to convey the message to others and let them do the same, if they wanted to do so. During the same last week of my holiday, I had thought of what I wanted to do, what I wanted others to organise, and what I wanted to achieve. I tried to change MSOC according to what I wanted. To make ourselves more knowledgeable and had at least a short term vision, no matter what it was. I changed the motto of MSOC from UNITY IS OUR PRIORITY to TOWARDS GENERATION OF KNOWLEDGE AND VISION. I had redesigned MSOC’s logo, in an effort to make it more attractive. I know that attractive logos and rephrasing mottos were not going to prove anything unless things are being done. But what I did was part of rebranding MSOC, which are very important in improving an organisation. I tried to generate ideas, throwing out opinions, hoping that these might change me and my colleagues in MSOC committee members.

My vision was to make all the members of the society to be prepared to be either doctors, dentists, pharmacists or other healthcare providers with extra capabilities. I don’t mind if they are capable of being an entertainer, or a good politician. But at least, we were not only ordinary doctors or pharmacists who spent most of their daily hours only in hospitals or in pharmacists, doing exactly the same thing others do. True Muslim healthcare providers are capable of more than diagnosing diseases or dispensing drugs. They are capable of being the leader, able to generate ideas and pointing it out to the public, and also competence enough to change the people around them, if not the world. It seems like my dream is too high to achieve. But, when there’s a will there’ll definitely a way to it.

Now, the time is approaching. I don’t have much time anymore. Yes, I am sad not to be better than the seniors, and I am very disappointed not to be able to materialise all the events planned, not to be able to organise events efficiently and not being able to produce better results of what were being done. But I hope the new committee line-up chosen will do better that what we did. I hope, at least my disappointment at not able to fulfil my ideas is erased by seeing the juniors rectifying my mistakes, correcting all the errors and are able to generate a better Muslim community in IMU.

1 comment:

AKarBJ said...

cool bro.. We've done our best with all the limitations. As long as we did it for Him, insyaALLAH, we'll be rewarded