At a time when questions of migration, citizenship and belonging are increasingly shaping public debate in South Africa and across the continent, Sheikh Laja Yasini reflects on his own complex identity: Malawian by paternal heritage, South African through his mother and Zimbabwean by birth. In this deeply personal reflection, he asks what truly defines a person when family, history and borders offer more than one answer — and why, for him, Islam ultimately settles the question.
WHO AM I?
Those who have been on this beautiful earth a little longer may remember a Jackie Chan movie that was shot, at least partly, in Mzansi. The movie features an Asian man with impressive skills who suffers from partial amnesia. He does not know his past, how he ended up where he is, or even who he is.
As he encounters the strange people around him, he repeatedly asks the question:
“Who am I?”
Eventually, those around him begin referring to him simply as “Who Am I?”
So, who am I?
My father is Malawian. My mother is South African. I was born and raised in Zimbabwe.
According to the patriarchal principles of nationality and identity familiar to many societies — and certainly the way the likes of Ngizwe Mchunu, Jacinta and their ilk might frame it — the child takes the identity of his father:
MALAWIAN.
But to my peeps back in Malawi, where matrilineal traditions are deeply embedded in many communities, I am a child of my mother:
SOUTH AFRICAN.
And by birth, I am a:
ZIMBABWEAN.
I know what you are thinking.
This sounds complicated.
And no, I am not bipolar!
It becomes even trickier when I consider my own children.
Their mother is South African, a MuTswana, born in Pretoria.
So where does that leave them?
Perhaps they should simply settle for being COLOUREDS.
I know the term is generally used in South Africa in an ethnic and historical sense. But, at the very least, my children and I — and many people scattered across different parts of the world — could jokingly describe ourselves as “country-coloureds.”
We are coloured by countries, histories, migrations, cultures and borders.
THE LEGAL SIDE OF THE STORY
Of course, this is not merely a story of cultural identity.
There is also a legal dimension to it.
The question of migration, nationality and citizenship has become particularly important, especially in South Africa today. Interestingly, the law itself recognises some of the very connections that make my identity seem so complicated.
South African citizenship legislation recognises citizenship through parentage. The current Citizenship Act provides for a person born in or outside South Africa to acquire citizenship by birth where one of the parents was a South African citizen at the time of birth. The Constitutional Court has also dealt directly with the historical development of citizenship by descent and citizenship through a South African parent in Chisuse and Others v Director-General, Department of Home Affairs and Another [2020] ZACC 20.
Malawian law likewise recognises citizenship by descent. Section 5 of the Malawi Citizenship Act 28 of 1966 provides a legal basis for citizenship for persons born outside Malawi where the relevant parental connection to Malawi is established.
Zimbabwean law does much the same. Section 6 of the Citizenship of Zimbabwe Act [Chapter 4:01] recognises citizenship by descent for persons born outside Zimbabwe where the statutory parental requirements are satisfied.
In other words, my identity is not merely something I have invented.
There are laws in South Africa, Malawi and Zimbabwe that recognise and give legal effect to different aspects of the very family history that produced me.
My story is therefore not simply one of confused identity.
It is also a story of migration, parentage, nationality and belonging, all of which have found recognition, in different ways, within the laws of the countries that form part of my story.
My father migrated from Malawi to South Africa and subsequently to Zimbabwe. My mother left Mzansi during the apartheid era, and our family story continued in Dzimba Dzamabwe — Zimbabwe, the land of stones.
I was born there.
I was raised there.
And the story of my family is intertwined with all three countries.
So yes, I know you are confused.
Believe me, I have been confused for more than four decades.
But there is one thing I do know.
I am an African.
I am a child of the southern part of Africa, born into the migrations, histories and cultures of this region, and raised according to many of its Southern African cultural principles.
But, most importantly:
I am a MUSLIM.
There is no identity crisis in that.
Like my fellow Muslims around the world, what ultimately matters to me is that I have submitted myself to the will of the Creator of the universe, the One who owns this world, including every part of Africa from which my heritage derives.
The masjid brings me a particular kind of solace.
There, I frequently encounter what we commonly call in South Africa:
“My brother from another mother.”
Different surnames.
Different languages.
Different countries of origin.
Different ethnicities.
Different histories.
Yet we stand together in the same rows, facing the same qiblah, worshipping the same Allah.
And perhaps that is where my identity question is finally resolved.
Not by a passport.
Not by a border.
Not by my father’s nationality.
Not by my mother’s nationality.
Not even by the country in which I happened to be born.
But by the simple reality of my existence as a Muslim.
THE STRANGER
I know that in Mzansi, Zimbabwe and Malawi, Islam is often perceived, incorrectly, as a religion of foreigners.
Frankly speaking, I am okay with that.
In fact, I might even regard it as a compliment.
To be a foreigner everywhere I go gives me at least one constant.
I am a stranger.
And being a stranger has a particular significance in Islam.
Our beloved Prophet ﷺ said:
“Islam began as something strange and it will return to being strange, so glad tidings to the strangers.”
This is authentically reported in Sahih Muslim.
The word used in the hadith is al-ghurabaa, the strangers.
The classical explanations of the hadith make clear that the “strangers” are not simply foreigners in the geographical sense. Rather, they are those who remain committed to Islam and righteousness when doing so makes them different from the people around them.
Their “strangeness” is therefore not primarily about nationality.
It is about principle.
They may be few.
They may be misunderstood.
They may not completely fit into the categories created by society.
But they remain steadfast upon what is right.
And perhaps that is why I am comfortable with being a stranger.
I have spent my life crossing borders of nationality, culture, language and heritage.
But Islam gives me an identity that does not depend on any of them.
EVERYONE IS A FOREIGNER
At the end of the day, everyone is a foreigner in this world.
Think about it.
None of us chose the country into which we were born.
None of us chose our parents, our nationality, our ethnicity, our language or the circumstances into which we entered this world.
We arrive here as strangers.
Then we are given names.
We are given nationalities.
We are taught languages.
We inherit cultures.
We draw lines across the earth and call them borders.
We divide the world into countries and call some places “home” and others “foreign”.
We spend our lives defending these identities as though they are permanent.
But they are not.
Because, ultimately, none of us belongs to this world permanently.
Every day is simply another step closer to our point of origin.
We came from Allah and to Allah is our return.
And perhaps this is where the question “Who am I?” finds its most profound answer.
I am African.
I am Malawian.
I am Zimbabwean.
I am South African.
I am a product of migration, history, family and circumstance.
I carry the stories of different countries within me.
But these are identities attached to my journey through this world.
My deepest identity is something else.
I am a Muslim.
I am a servant of Allah.
And that identity does not require a passport.
It does not depend upon a border.
It does not require me to choose between Malawi, South Africa or Zimbabwe.
It transcends geography.
It transcends ethnicity.
It transcends nationality.
And perhaps that is why the Prophet ﷺ’s description of Islam beginning as something strange, and returning to being strange, resonates so deeply.
The ghurabaa, the strangers, are not necessarily those who come from another country.
They are those who remain committed to the truth when the world around them moves in another direction.
And perhaps there is another kind of ghurbah that we all share.
We are all strangers here because this world is not our final home.
We are travellers.
We are temporary residents.
We pass through countries, cities, cultures and generations.
We arrive.
We live.
We leave.
And eventually, the distinctions over which we argue so passionately become irrelevant.
The Malawian.
The Zimbabwean.
The South African.
The MuTswana.
The foreigner.
The citizen.
The immigrant.
The local.
All of us return to the same earth.
The Prophet ﷺ reminded us of our common origin:
“All people are the children of Adam, and Adam was created from dust.”
So perhaps the greatest answer to “Who am I?” is not found in the passport I carry, the country in which I was born, or the ancestry from which I descend.
It is found in knowing where I came from and where I am ultimately going.
I came from Allah.
And to Allah I will return.
So yes —
I am Malawian.
I am Zimbabwean.
I am South African.
I am African.
I am a husband.
I am a father.
I am many things shaped by geography, history and circumstance.
But above all:
I AM A MUSLIM.
And that, for me, settles the question.
Who am I?
Just a traveller passing through.
A stranger in a world that was never meant to be my permanent home.
Sheikh Laja Yasini is an Islamic scholar, legal advisor, and candidate legal practitioner who serves as the Director of Legal and Shariah Compliance at the Independent Islamic Court (IIC).
