The Role of a Mosque in Politics: Muslim Perspectives on Jamia Mosque in Nairobi

A Mosque in the Muslim life is a very important place of worship where Muslims gather five times every day for congregation prayers. Prophet Muhammad, may peace and blessing of Allah be upon him, build a Mosques immediately after the Hijra to Medina, then eventual adopted it for religious gathering, educational functions, home for the homeless, office for public affairs both legislative and executive, hall for military meetings and court for adjudicating on cases and assembly for the political gatherings and guidance. Enemies, Qureshi realized the role of a Mosque in Politics and therefore build a rival mosque called “Dhirar Mosque” whose purpose was to divide Muslims and become the base for the enemies; Allah ordained that the Mosque to be demolished and forbid the Prophet, May peace and blessing of Allah be upon him, from observing the inauguration Salah in it.  The guided caliphs, may Allah be pleased with them, in their wisdom created places for Governmental functions outside the Mosque, the Mosque remained a place for Muslim Public gathering offering guidance in religious, social, economic and political matters. However when Muslim were divided along different political lines during the era of Ali, may Allah be pleased with him, each Political group mobilized its followers in their respective Mosques for the war and its propaganda. It seems Ali was not in support of this development since he suggested that he shall not bar his political rivals from his Mosques alluding to the independence and neutral role of the Mosque in dispute among Muslims. We may infer from this political history that the role of the Mosque in Politics is not specifically provided for in the Holy Quran and what the Prophet did was in response to the immediate needs that why the guided caliphs did not see any wrong in assigning new roles and departing from the early ones. The ideal situation was that the Mosque should be a symbol of Muslim unit for common purpose in issues affecting Muslims, however in matters where Muslims are divided the Mosques should have a neutral position and ability to act as an arbitrator as drawn from lessons in Ali’s guidance. Jamia Mosque have been constructed by the Muslim Asian Community represented by Syed Maulana Abdullah Shah between 1902 and 1906 remained aloof in Politics even in late 1980s when Sheikh Abdullahi Naseer a Muslim Scholar and a Politician was appointed to be the Imam and expressed his political views in public his services were terminated ostensibly because of his support for the Iranian Revolution but in reality he had attempted to ascribed a political role to the Mosque. At this time Muslims believed did not believe in the linkage between Muslim Religion and Politics. In 1988, Sheikh Ali Shee, a Muslim Scholar specialized in Shariah and a former Kadhi well conversant with current affairs was appointed as the Imam for Jamia Mosque. He openly expressed his political views and even influenced Muslim mass to adopt his views, he openly criticized the Government and become the icon of Muslim Political guidance in Kenya. Muslims changed their attitudes towards politics and felt that Muslim Religion had a place to play in Politics. The Church at that time had also established its foot in Politics with Bishop Alexander Muge, who was assassinated for his political views, Bishop Henry Okullu and other Christian leader vocally criticizing the Kanu Government. The role played by Jamia Mosque in introduction of Multi-Party System in Kenya in early 1990 is not clear, however students of Prof Malik Hussein who had frequent lectures in the Mosque before Friday summons like Mr. Abdu Rahman Wandati registered a significant role in the struggle. However, the Political influence of Sheikh Ali Shee had prepared the minds of Muslims in Kenya to accept assignment of a political role to the Mosque. Sheikh Ali Shee was also terminated from Jamia Mosque due to his attempt to define the role of the Mosque in Politics. In the struggle against President Moi’s Government during the Multi Party era Jamia Mosque was reluctant to support the Opposition and tried to be aloof in Politics. On the other hand Supreme Council of Muslim of Kenya had now engaged in Politics and demanding for respect and protection of rights of Muslims in Kenya under the leadership of the late Ahmed Khalif as the Secretary General. Supkem went ahead to participate in the Mfungano Initiative in the quest for a new Constitution in Kenya. Jamia Mosque committee admitted new members such as Billow Kerrow who were politician and professionals in other fields specifically accountancy, only to move the center of influence of the Mosque from the Imam to the Committee. In rivalry with Supkem, Jamia Mosque engaged in Politics by issuing political statements on different political events frequently. In 2002 General Elections, Jamia Mosque played an active role in supporting the Rainbow Coalition to oust Kanu for Power successfully. In the 2005 Referendum, Jamia Mosque openly supported the No, Orange Campaign successfully apparently due to its attempt to abolish the Kadhi’s Courts gradually. In the 2007 General Elections, Jamia Mosque once again supported the Orange Movement with its leaders being part of the Muslim Leaders Forum as part of the campaign strategy for ODM. Since the election campaign had taken tribal dimensions the Muslim community was not immune from the division. Muslims whose tribes supported the PNU Party were not happy with the role played by Jamia Mosque in those elections. In the aftermath of the Elections with disputed election results and violence erupting in different parts of the Country, Jamia Mosque could not play the role of an arbitrator since it was already partisan. In the 2010 Referendum Jamia Mosque sought to rally Muslims behind the proposed Constitution successfully, some dissenting Muslim voices did not affect the position adversely. In the 2013 Elections Jamia Mosque was reluctant to declare its support for the Opposition in public although in reality it did support the CORD candidate against the TNA, worse still Muslims were divided along tribal line between CORD and TNA and Jamia Mosque was not able to rally them behind CORD. It is apparent that if dispute could have arose between CORD and TNA requiring intervention of the civil society, TNA followers could not have submitted to the arbitration role of Jamia Mosque. Consequently, Jamia Mosque has the role of providing political guidance to Kenya Muslims specifically and the entire Country generally as part of the Kenya Civil Society. However utmost care should be exercised in selecting the issues to be supported to be limited to Public Interest of the entire Muslim Community or the Country at large. Issues emanating from difference of opinions and personalities, Jamia Mosque should only offer objective advice on them while maintaining its neutral position and independence. It is therefore evident that Jamia Mosque will require proper capacity building support to enable it play this role

Extracting information from the text of electronic medical records to improve case detection: a systematic review

Background: Electronic medical records (EMRs) are revolutionizing health-related research. One key issue for study quality is the accurate identification of patients with the condition of interest. Information in EMRs can be entered as structured codes or unstructured free text. The majority of research studies have used only coded parts of EMRs for case-detection, which may bias findings, miss cases, and reduce study quality. This review examines whether incorporating information from text into case-detection algorithms can improve research quality. Methods: A systematic search returned 9659 papers, 67 of which reported on the extraction of information from free text of EMRs with the stated purpose of detecting cases of a named clinical condition. Methods for extracting information from text and the technical accuracy of case-detection algorithms were reviewed. Results: Studies mainly used US hospital-based EMRs, and extracted information from text for 41 conditions using keyword searches, rule-based algorithms, and machine learning methods. There was no clear difference in case-detection algorithm accuracy between rule-based and machine learning methods of extraction. Inclusion of information from text resulted in a significant improvement in algorithm sensitivity and area under the receiver operating characteristic in comparison to codes alone (median sensitivity 78% (codes + text) vs 62% (codes), P = .03; median area under the receiver operating characteristic 95% (codes + text) vs 88% (codes), P = .025). Conclusions: Text in EMRs is accessible, especially with open source information extraction algorithms, and significantly improves case detection when combined with codes. More harmonization of reporting within EMR studies is needed, particularly standardized reporting of algorithm accuracy metrics like positive predictive value (precision) and sensitivity (recall)

A case study in open source innovation: developing the Tidepool Platform for interoperability in type 1 diabetes management.

OBJECTIVE:Develop a device-agnostic cloud platform to host diabetes device data and catalyze an ecosystem of software innovation for type 1 diabetes (T1D) management. MATERIALS AND METHODS:An interdisciplinary team decided to establish a nonprofit company, Tidepool, and build open-source software. RESULTS:Through a user-centered design process, the authors created a software platform, the Tidepool Platform, to upload and host T1D device data in an integrated, device-agnostic fashion, as well as an application ("app"), Blip, to visualize the data. Tidepool's software utilizes the principles of modular components, modern web design including REST APIs and JavaScript, cloud computing, agile development methodology, and robust privacy and security. DISCUSSION:By consolidating the currently scattered and siloed T1D device data ecosystem into one open platform, Tidepool can improve access to the data and enable new possibilities and efficiencies in T1D clinical care and research. The Tidepool Platform decouples diabetes apps from diabetes devices, allowing software developers to build innovative apps without requiring them to design a unique back-end (e.g., database and security) or unique ways of ingesting device data. It allows people with T1D to choose to use any preferred app regardless of which device(s) they use. CONCLUSION:The authors believe that the Tidepool Platform can solve two current problems in the T1D device landscape: 1) limited access to T1D device data and 2) poor interoperability of data from different devices. If proven effective, Tidepool's open source, cloud model for health data interoperability is applicable to other healthcare use cases

Electronic Health Records and Support For Primary Care Teamwork

This study examined primary care practices' experiences using electronic health records (EHRs) as they strive to function as teams in patientcentered medical homes (PCMHs). We identify how EHRs facilitate and pose challenges to teamwork and how practices overcame such challenges. We describe solutions and identify opportunities to improve care processes as well as EHR functionalities and policies, to support teamwork

ROMOP: a light-weight R package for interfacing with OMOP-formatted electronic health record data.

Objectives:Electronic health record (EHR) data are increasingly used for biomedical discoveries. The nature of the data, however, requires expertise in both data science and EHR structure. The Observational Medical Out-comes Partnership (OMOP) common data model (CDM) standardizes the language and structure of EHR data to promote interoperability of EHR data for research. While the OMOP CDM is valuable and more attuned to research purposes, it still requires extensive domain knowledge to utilize effectively, potentially limiting more widespread adoption of EHR data for research and quality improvement. Materials and methods:We have created ROMOP: an R package for direct interfacing with EHR data in the OMOP CDM format. Results:ROMOP streamlines typical EHR-related data processes. Its functions include exploration of data types, extraction and summarization of patient clinical and demographic data, and patient searches using any CDM vocabulary concept. Conclusion:ROMOP is freely available under the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) license and can be obtained from GitHub (http://github.com/BenGlicksberg/ROMOP). We detail instructions for setup and use in the Supplementary Materials. Additionally, we provide a public sandbox server containing synthesized clinical data for users to explore OMOP data and ROMOP (http://romop.ucsf.edu)

Green construction in India: gaining a deeper understanding

A workshop on green construction was organized in New Delhi in July 2008 by Jamia Millia University, India and University of Salford, U.K., aiming to increase 'green' practices that are environmentally friendly and energy efficient. The workshop included participants from regulatory bodies, public and private construction companies and researchers. The object of the workshop was to provide an opportunity to capture issues, challenges and research issues in green practices throughout the supply chain in the construction sector in India. The methodology constituted a survey that was provided to all participants, where eight questions were composed by the facilitators. The participants were asked about their views on voluntary and compulsory ways of assessment and audit of green implementation in India. The findings of the workshop featured major challenges, drivers, initiatives, and the ways of effective implementation as well as enforcement on the discussed topic

Visit to Pakistani Women's Madrasas: April 2007

I visited five women's madrasas, in addition to meeting separately with other male madrasa leaders and briefly sitting in on Hafiz Khalil and Shabbir Ahmed's own 10-day workshop. The report documents the experiences of the author touring women's madrasas in Pakistan

Fuzzy Logic in Clinical Practice Decision Support Systems

Computerized clinical guidelines can provide significant benefits to health outcomes and costs, however, their effective implementation presents significant problems. Vagueness and ambiguity inherent in natural (textual) clinical guidelines is not readily amenable to formulating automated alerts or advice. Fuzzy logic allows us to formalize the treatment of vagueness in a decision support architecture. This paper discusses sources of fuzziness in clinical practice guidelines. We consider how fuzzy logic can be applied and give a set of heuristics for the clinical guideline knowledge engineer for addressing uncertainty in practice guidelines. We describe the specific applicability of fuzzy logic to the decision support behavior of Care Plan On-Line, an intranet-based chronic care planning system for General Practitioners