KRISTY RAM­NAR­INE

kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

Azz­izah Mo­hammed-Ma­jeed is an ad­vo­cate for em­pow­er­ing and up­lift­ing Mus­lim women. It was an easy de­ci­sion when her hus­band, Moulana Atif Ma­jeed Su­laimani, ap­proached her with the idea of pub­lish­ing a women’s mag­a­zine.

Af­ter months of ded­i­ca­tion, IQRA An-Nisa—a women’s mag­a­zine—was re­leased just in time for Ra­madan 2025.

“IQRA An-Nisa women’s mag­a­zine is a plat­form ded­i­cat­ed to shar­ing the voic­es, achieve­ments and in­spir­ing sto­ries of Mus­lim women,” she said.

“This mag­a­zine was cre­at­ed to cel­e­brate and sup­port women in all as­pects of life—faith, fam­i­ly, ca­reer, and per­son­al growth.”

IQRA An-Nisa is a spe­cial Ra­madan pub­li­ca­tion stem­ming from the orig­i­nal IQRA Mag­a­zine, which was start­ed by the late Moulana Su­laimani.

“He was my un­cle-in-law, an Is­lam­ic schol­ar from Pak­istan who came to Trinidad 30 years ago,” she said.

“He ded­i­cat­ed his work to the Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ty. Af­ter his pass­ing, my hus­band de­cid­ed to con­tin­ue his un­cle’s lega­cy. Last year, he came to me and said, ‘Let’s do a women’s ver­sion of IQRA,’ and that is where it all start­ed.”

Mo­hammed-Ma­jeed saw the need for a plat­form for Mus­lim women.“The mag­a­zine’s aim is to of­fer con­tent that strength­ens faith, pro­vides mo­ti­va­tion and sup­ports women in their per­son­al and pro­fes­sion­al jour­neys,” she added.

“To share valu­able knowl­edge on top­ics like health, fam­i­ly, ca­reer and Is­lam­ic val­ues to help women lead bal­anced and ful­fill­ing lives. Al­so, to show­case the ac­com­plish­ments of Mus­lim women, break­ing stereo­types and cel­e­brat­ing their con­tri­bu­tions to so­ci­ety.

“And to cre­ate a space where women can con­nect, share ex­pe­ri­ences and find en­cour­age­ment in their roles as moth­ers, pro­fes­sion­als and lead­ers.”

It is Mo­hammed-Ma­jeed’s first time putting to­geth­er a pub­li­ca­tion.

“This is my first time as the chief ed­i­tor of IQRA An-Nisa Women Mag­a­zine,” she said.

“I’ve al­ways had a pas­sion for writ­ing, or­gan­is­ing, and up­lift­ing women. While this is a new role for me, I’ve been ac­tive­ly in­volved in com­mu­ni­ty work, events and ini­tia­tives that em­pow­er Mus­lim women. The ex­pe­ri­ence has been both chal­leng­ing and re­ward­ing, and I’m ex­cit­ed to see the mag­a­zine grow.

“I own a con­struc­tion busi­ness, where I ap­ply my knowl­edge of busi­ness man­age­ment to en­sure qual­i­ty, trust and ex­cel­lence in every project. My back­ground in busi­ness has giv­en me the skills to suc­cess­ful­ly man­age and grow my ven­tures while main­tain­ing a strong com­mit­ment to in­tegri­ty and ser­vice.”

The moth­er of two ad­mits bal­anc­ing moth­er­hood, busi­ness and IQRA An-Nisa is chal­leng­ing.

“That’s the beau­ty of be­ing self-em­ployed—I have the flex­i­bil­i­ty to man­age my time,” she said.

“I set my own hours, mak­ing sure to ded­i­cate time to my fam­i­ly while keep­ing my busi­ness and mag­a­zine run­ning smooth­ly. Plan­ning and pri­ori­tis­ing helped me to fo­cus on what’s most im­por­tant each day. Al­so, del­e­gat­ing tasks al­lowed me to get things done with­out feel­ing over­whelmed.”

Most im­por­tant­ly, she added, “I trust in Al­lah, know­ing that with the right bal­ance and ef­fort, every­thing will fall in­to place.”

IQRA An-Nisa was dis­trib­uted at var­i­ous masjids through­out the coun­try dur­ing Ra­madan. The an­nu­al pub­li­ca­tion can be found on the Face­book page Iqra Mag­a­zine.