Zon S&T: The PMH secretariat that was generated by brotherhood

Last night, as I was clearing my laptop of unwanted, expired files, I encountered a folder labelled "Persatuan Mahasiswa Hadhari". In it was another sub-folder labelled "Sekretariat Kejuruteraan". In it were numerous files of my/our works in ye olde days, consisting of the draft of the first ever copy of PMH's official newsletter, the Raudhah Tribune, programme reports, minutes of meetings. My God, how the years have passed.

It was the middle of Ramadhan in 2005, I attended the first Annual General Meeting of PMH, which was then newly established, being only a month old. It was during this meeting that the first official president, Yusfizal Mat Yusof, who would later become one of my closest companion, was elected.

Without even realizing it, I was nominated for the post of Chairman for the division of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering by my friend, Azmil Abrar, who was also the founding father of PMH, and won uncontested.

The initial stage of enliving the division was a tough one. Unlike other chairpersons of other divisions, I knew no one in the Majlis Tertinggi (High Council). Furthermore, I've never met them before. One night, as it happens, I came face-to-face with the president himself. From there, I asked him of what I am currently supposed to do. He told me to firstly recruit students from my faculty, and fill in the posts of vice-chairman, secretary, treasurer, and relevant bureaus.

In the first round of recruitment, there were only 6 people; 4 girls, 2 guys. This was predicted of course since, in my days, engineering students were somewhat isolated from the world of religious societies and activities. Furthermore, the term Hadhari in those days was a strong political sentiment. I took this oppurtunity to explain as to how the term came into existence, plus the REAL objectives of this society

This was followed by assigning posts to them. Since not all of them were electrical students, automatically the division of Civil Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering was born. Alhamdulillah, in the weeks to come, a generous number of students called / sms-ed expressing their intention to be recruited. Not only from the engineering faculties, but also from the faculties of pharmacy and medical.

Since we were not assigned any special tasks by the High Council for that particular semester, we were free at our own will to plan our own activities / programmes. Amongst all listed, the one activity which lasted until today was the establishment of PMH's official newsletter.

Only three were involved in generating this newsletter, including myself, as many others were involved in final-year presentations, say nothing of those who signed-up, but never turned up.

The name given to this newsletter was Qaulul Mujaddid, later renamed Qaulul Jadid. It was a simple one; one-paged, and only one simple article (extracted from the book, Laa Tahzan). The beauty of it is that, as it was not official, being but a test-drive, we were not funded. So, each of us (including those not involved in this newsletter) contributed any RM1, RM5, RM10 that we had so that this 'project' can initiate.

Following the success of this newsletter, distributed like hot cakes, we decided to upgrade the newsletter. Since we were nearing the examination period, plans were made for the newsletter to be presented in front of the High Council next semester, and acquire the rights to manage it.

The next semester, the newsletter project was successfully presented during a meeting with the High Council and EXCO members. We were acquired the rights. I mentioned our intentions to rename and regenerate the newsletter. An EXCO member, Khulailah suggested the name SOUNDS OF HEAVEN. I took this name to the division meeting, and after considering, and using the arabic term of HEAVEN which translates it as RAUDHAH, we renamed the newsletter, RAUDHAH TRIBUNE. And thus, a newsletter was born; with multiple pages similar to the size of a standard magazine. We were funded by the Islamic Center of UiTM (CITU).

During that semester, many left UiTM, not to mention the only surviving division being that of electrical and civil. And so, we combined our division and renamed it, GABUNGAN FAKULTI - FAKULTI KEJURUTERAAN. That semester, apart from the newsletter project, we were assigned to establish a public forum. It was the first tough challenge ever for us, having no experience whatsoever, with limited assistance. Alhamdulillah, despite certain glitches, the programme went on well.

The following year, Yusfizal was replaced by Zul Husni, of whom I would later make a companion out of him. In the earlier stages, I was no longer associated with the division. I was an EXCO member for a week, until the Student Affairs' Unit asked me to resign due to technical glitches. I was assigned Head of Publications, in charge of the newsletter established previously.

I was never happy. One of it being that 'while I was gone', the High Council-elect made modifications to the newsletter, even changing the name. Alhamdulillah, they changed the newsletter back to its original state after multiple arguments. But, upon all, I was working with bureaucrat-minded people.

In February, Zul Husni reestablished the society divisions, including my former division, which was renamed SEKRETARIAT ZON SAINS & TEKNOLOGI (Secretariat of the Science & Technology Division), which comprised of all engineering faculties, plus pharmacy, medical, and dentistry faculties. I was recalled to lead the secretariat.

My first order of the day, was to recall all those who were previously part of the division, and still in UiTM. There were a large number of fresh members too, most of them from the pharmacy, dentistry, and medical faculties. Amongst all, they were people who were willing to engage themselves in any given task/activity.

We had our first assignment from the president, and it was this assignment (programme) that contributed to the landslide popularity of this secretariat. Not the succession of the programme, but the management, and the people who were involved in it; most of them being freshies with no experiences, but performing high rank tasks (in those days, it was common for a certain task of high rank to be distributed among closest friends and those with connections to influenced individuals).

Later, after being informed of the possibility of being transferred to Penang, I vacated my post, only to receive a letter by Zul Husni a week later, insisting that I replace him temporarily as president of PMH, since I 'had nothing better to do'.

My two years being in the division was a memorable one. Despite the 2007 half being a promising one, with all the popularity earned, I was more devoted to the 2006 half.

Compared to 2007, in 2006 we were nobody in the eyes of many. We started humble, no cable no nothing. Everyone struggled to keep the division going. Everyone had their share of responsibility and contribution. We were strongly attached to one another, being a community of less than 10.

The initial success of this secretariat / division was not based on bureaucracy. It was based on the flexibility of performing a given task. It was not based on the number of strengths, it was based on the strength of the heart.