At the International Conference on Family Planning 2016, GHN’s Maryalice Yakutchik conducts a Q&A with Sheikh Mangala Luaba, Grand Mufti, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Chairman, Union of Muslim Councils for East, Central and Southern Africa.
NUSA DUA, INDONESIA— Regally statuesque in his long black robe and gold hat, Sheikh Mangala Luaba favors a more humble moniker over his many loftier titles: “I am not grand,” the Grand Mufti insists. “God is grand. I am small. I am a servant of God.”
He is not the least bit reluctant to make a grand claim for family planning, however, linking it to nothing less than “the welfare of mankind.” As a faith leader, he has been active in the family planning movement since 2008.