Al-Qalam 
Imam Dr. A. Rashied Omar
On Tuesday, 4 November, 34-year-old Zohran Kwame Mamdani made history by becoming the first Muslim mayor of New York City. His victory, grounded in a campaign animated by hope, creativity, and deep social justice commitments, represents a refreshing new wave of progressive politics that resonates with working-class communities and young activists alike.
An African Childhood with Modest but Lasting Influence
Born in Kampala, Uganda, in 1991, Zohran spent a brief but formative part of his early childhood in Kampala, Durban and later in Cape Town, where his father, Professor Mahmood Mamdani, held academic positions, first at the University of Kampala, a brief visiting professorship at the University of Durban-Westville (now University of Kwazulu-Natal) and later at the University of Cape Town (UCT), where he served as the AC Jordan Chair in African Studies from 1996 to 1999.
During the Mamdani family’s brief stay in Durban, the young toddler Zohran would be taken on walks at Mitchells Park. It was, however, when the family moved to Cape Town (1996–1999), that Zohran began his schooling. While enrolled full-time at St. George’s Grammar School in Mowbray for his primary education, Zohran on weekends attended the Saturday Islamic madrasa at the Claremont Main Road Masjid (CMRM), where his father once delivered a memorable pre-khutbah talk. These years, though few, situated him in an environment where learning, faith, and justice were deeply intertwined.
During a visit to Cape Town by Zohran’s grandparents, Maulana Sayyid Aftab Haidar, Director of the Ahlul Bait Islamic Centre in Ottery, recalled how the young Zohran joined them at religious and educational programmes. His grandparents’ quiet spirituality and compassionate faith clearly left a lasting moral imprint. In a recent interview with Rev. Andrew Wilkes of the Double Love Experience Church in Brooklyn, Zohran reflected: “The thing that my grandmother taught me is that to be a good Muslim is to be a good person. It is to help those in need and to harm no one. The lesson I have from my faith that informs my politics is the importance of serving others, and doing so without asking who they are or where they are from.”
Although Zohran’s South African sojourn lasted only from the ages of five to eight, it left what can best be described as a modest yet enduring imprint on his moral and political consciousness. Immersed in the progressive ethos of post-apartheid South Africa, the Mamdani household offered him early glimpses of a faith rooted in justice, a scholarship attuned to human dignity, and a social world that linked compassion with civic engagement.
It is heartening for us, as South Africans, to know that this environment, however small its contribution, helped nurture the ethical sensibilities of a future leader whose politics are animated by compassion, equity, and solidarity.
Lessons for South African Social Justice Activists
In today’s South Africa, where political disillusionment and fatigue often threaten to paralyze civic life, Zohran Mamdani’s victory offers powerful lessons. His model of politics, grounded in empathy, proximity, and creative grassroots organising, reminds us that transformative change is still possible when citizens are treated as partners, not merely as voters.
We too can learn to blend the best of community-based grassroots mobilisation with the imaginative energy of digital activism, crafting movements that resonate with younger generations while remaining rooted in the lived realities of our people. His story invites South African activists to reimagine political engagement in an age of cynicism, and to rebuild trust across divides of race, class, and faith with authenticity and moral clarity.
A Shared Ethos of Justice and Hope
As we at the Claremont Main Road Masjid celebrate Zohran’s achievement, we receive his story as a gentle reminder that the seeds we plant, through teaching, organizing, or nurturing the moral imagination of the young, may one day grow into movements of justice beyond our imagining. We pray that his leadership continue to embody the values of compassion, justice, and service that lie at the heart of our shared faith and humanity.
