It was all celebrations, glam, beauty and hype yesterday during the Somali Night Celebrations which was officially held last night and the hall was filled with people from different parts of the country.
This is despite the fact that the Somali Night Organizers faced backlash after religious leaders allegedly condemned the celebrations saying that they were against the religious beliefs and had nothing to do with the Somali Culture.
Apparently, the Sheikhs had warned the youth not to attend the celebrations since it violates the laws of their Holy Book.
Some backed up the Sheikhs saying that they were right and that they condemned it in accordance to Islamic law and not from their own thought and opinion.
As the agenda of the celebrations is with the intention to allow people to network and also get the opportunity to showcase their talents; there were reasons as to why it was highly condemned.
The mingling between men and women and the fact that women danced in front of men was termed a inappropriate with some netizens saying that it was shameful and sexually arousing which makes it sin.
Some however were angered and accused the Sheikhs and religious leaders of having double standards for failing to condemn other evils equally.
look at this hypocrisy! I lost faith in some of these sheikhs during the campaigns for reasons best known to many. If they mean it, let them initiate on conversations on what really ails the society like deadbeat fathers, corruption, terrorism, Qabiilist agendas and the likes. ?
— Xubbi Farah (@xubbifarah) December 16, 2018
Ever since the hype about the event started, there was a protracted argument with some saying that only the lost generation would be excited for such events. Seems people did not really take up this critic and their intention remained pure and were up for the agenda and equally for the celebrations.
According to sheikh umul ,somali night organiser are devil.
Be careful bro. Go to hell fire is not cool.— Adan A. Duale (@adan_duc) December 15, 2018
From another opinion by a netizen, a man expressed his disappointment saying that he was ready to celebrate the culture until he noted some of the things that were intoxicated with the modern practices.
“I was fine with celebrating our culture untill catwalks and “see me through” “baatis” laced with european make up concotions and arab turbans raided our screens.
This was not a cultural celebration, it was alot more like celebrating the integration between, modernaty nudity and a culture once celebrated as the “most conservative of all” reads tweets
Netizens appreciated the efforts of the organizers noting that it was good that it triggered debate so that they may improve and fix the errors that were noted.
Even with these critics, the Director of the event Ali Bash in an interview noted that they plan on making it annual event.