Imtiaz Sooliman – Visionaries’ Lounge Episode 2

To handle a disaster is easy for me.

To handle conflict at home is not easy,

my son, I'm not asking you, I'm instructing you to form an

organization. The name in Arabic will be wakul waqifin. You

Good evening and welcome to visionaries lounge. It's a huge

pleasure to have you with us. In fact, if you were sitting on this

couch next to me, I'd offer you some tea or maybe some water, just

to show you some good old fashioned hospitality. As you

know, generosity is encouraged by every society, and when it comes

to generosity, my next guest is someone who has gone over and

above the call of duty, Doctor MTS. Suleiman, the founder and the

chairperson of gift of the givers. It is Africa's largest disaster

relief agency. Docker, very good evening to you. Thank you so much

for joining us. Good evening. Thanks for having me on the show.

It's a huge pleasure. Let's talk about mtrs before he was the great

doctor and humanitarian that we know today. Where did you grow up

in the north west, in a town called potches room, very small

place, but it was a wonderful place. It still is a wonderful

place. And we grew up in an extended family, grandfather,

uncles, brothers, sisters, families, all living together in

one big yard, chickens, fowls, everybody in all in the same

place. It is a lovely upbringing in a lovely place. It sounds like

you got to up to a lot of mischief. Tell me a little bit

about that. More than mischief, I think we grew up with a lot of

love between us. Cousins did everything together. Brothers did

everything together. Even the elder ones like my father and his

brothers, my grandfather and his brothers. Everybody did everything

together. And it was not only a close knit family, it was a close

knit community. Everybody was one family. If somebody was having a

wedding, even if you were not invited, you came to help. So it

was something that built spirit. It built unity, it built a sense

of community. And that's what I love. Our projects from even up

till today, I'm seeing a thread that's starting to form now in

your life, is that where you got the sense of giving and the sense

of helping humankind? Well, the giving came more from my father's

shop and my grandfather. They are traders, and my grandfather's

passed on now, and even his father has passed on. But they started

off the customers were mostly black people and poor African

people living in potters room, and you would find everybody used to

buy an account. That was a tradition in those days. So that

trend ran from the great grandfather to the grandfather to

the Father, and even runs today. And the other way, my mother, she

started an employment Bureau, and she said it's important to help

people help themselves. So she found that, you know, making

people earn themselves, get dignity or progress in life. And

she had some people who came from nowhere, and they became top CEOs

and companies, you know. And the other thing she used to say is,

the poor, the real ones who need help, don't ask. So you must go

out in the area, and if you can afford only one food parcel, then

do only one food parcel, but don't dot, don't sit and don't do

anything, because I want to now focus on your tertiary education.

So you're done with high school and the like, and you go to

varsity, you study to become a doctor, and you think to yourself,

I'll be a GP, etc. What were you thinking at that time? No, the

idea to become a doctor started also in portageville, because

there was a family doctor called Dr hafeji. And what I loved about

this man is, whenever they called him, whether it's Monday, after

hours weekend, he would come with a broad smile, no no sulky face,

and he would do what, besides coming with a happy smile, he also

was a very good doctor, as if that idea came from that age, that I am

going to be a doctor when I get big. How long did you practice?

Eight and a half years. It was I started on the first of January in

1986 and I closed my doors on the 30th of June 1994 I want to talk

about why you closed your doors. Let's let's go there,

because something bigger came in my life, gift of the givers, and

that had a fantastic beginning. It was in Turkey I visited a

spiritual teacher in 1992

my wife was with me, and we came to a Muslim holy place. What was

very amazing that in a Muslim holy place, people from all religions

were there, Jews, Christians, Hindus, and even people said we

don't believe in any deity or any form of God. But.

Feel a vibe, and they were there, and they were from all different

countries. And after the program, the preacher just looks at me. I

can see his eyes are focused on me, but he's connecting somewhere

else. He says, in FLUENT Turkish, I don't speak a word of Turkish.

In fluent Turkish, my son, I'm not asking you, I'm instructing you to

form an organization. The name in Arabic will be wagful waqifen,

translated into English, means gift of the givers. You will serve

all people of all races, of all religions, of all classes, of all

colors, of all cultures, of any geographical location and of any

political affiliation, but you will serve them unconditionally.

You hear this great revelation. The atmosphere is charged up. You

hear this word, your wife is next to you. Eventually, you're on a

plane, you're back to South Africa. And then what? And then

take it so serious.

I thought that this old man is telling me something. Is the old

man is telling me something. I've got a private practice in South

Africa when I'm going to be doing all these things, yeah? Maybe one

food parcel here, feeding scheme. There's talking of something

small. You know, part time you have to respect the old man. You

can't say much. Okay, let's show something with some respect, yeah?

And, you know, discipline. I said, Fine. I had no idea what he was

talking about, but every time I met him subsequently, I've been to

Turkey 21 times. He said, My son, this thing will get bigger. It

will get bigger. It will get bigger. He's gone. I passed on in

1999 but I know what he's talking about now. And immediately I came

away from Turkey. What happened? The inspiration came. You need to

respond to the boy in war. The war in Bosnia, Eastern Europe, is

tearing itself apart. I'm thinking to myself, person start logically,

he does something small in his own country. Yeah, yeah. From food

puzzles, of course, blanket something simple, of course,

exactly on your own, but you didn't have your team? No, no, no

team that time, one man, one man. And I said, No, I full faith in

what this man has said, and that's how he responded to Bosnia. And

that was the beginning of gift of the givers, 31 containers, where

it we took in food, blankets and other kind of stuff in November.

That was August, 92 doc, let's hold that thought for a little

moment, and when we come back, we'll find out what Dr MTR

Suleiman could possibly still want to do over and above the

exceptional work that gift of the givers has already done. Stay with

us.

Welcome back, and thank you once again for joining us. We continue

with our riveting discussion with Dr MTR Suleiman. He is the founder

and the chairperson of gift of the givers. Just before the break,

Doc, we were speaking about this great revelation that you had

received, that you would start a gift of the givers. You thought it

would be something that a small scale. It turned out to be much

larger than you had anticipated. Your very first mission, your

operation to Bosnia. What was that like? Very challenging. Almost 90%

of what I know today I learned in that first project, crossing

international boundaries, Reserve Bank rules, SARS rules, being in a

war zone, encountering opposition, getting shot at getting bombed,

you know, trying to be effective for doing intervention. And the

point we came to in after the first two missions, we decided to

build a hospital, because, for the first time ever, a containerized

mobile hospital was built. A big international media company

compared the South African hospital to any of the best

hospitals in Europe, and it was a product of African technology,

innovated by Africans and taken to Europe. So it makes me really

proud to be South African.

We started as a disaster with relief agency. Everybody knows us

for that internationally, but we started adding on other projects,

agriculture, boreholes, as life skills, counseling services,

wheelchair distribution and 21 types of projects. But within the

project itself, we could still handle more than one disaster a

and then several disasters at the same time. And as the capacity

grew and we started bringing management and new teams and

people with heart, the most important thing is people with

heart. What compassion, what an Ubuntu spirit. And South Africa is

full of people like those

in a war in Gaza or Syria. Within three minutes, we have 120 medical

guys want to go into a war zone. It's dangerous, and they can see

how people are dying in the war zone. That's the spirit that

drives you. Where do you get the money? 99.9%

of the money comes from ordinary South Africans. And I'll give you

another example about the Ubuntu spirit of this country. You know,

orange farm. People in orange farm, or kids in orange farm,

don't even have shoes to go to school. Forget the lunch they

don't even have the lunch box. They don't have a bag for the for

the school books. They have no jersey. In the winter, the kids in

orange farm raised 40,000 Rand for the people.

In Somalia. Wow. So how can you not be driven when you have this

kind of support from what you do on the other side and those behind

you and faith in the middle of all this? It hasn't come without

controversy, though. Doc, some of your interventions, especially

when it comes to hostage negotiations, some people have

been saying you stepping on the toes of government, that perhaps

you do things unilaterally, talk to us about some of those

obstacles along the way. I have one policy, the teaching of my

teacher, best among people are those who benefit mankind. I would

do everything possible to benefit mankind or to help people.

Controversy doesn't matter to me, as long as it's right. If I was in

that situation, if my wife or my child was in that situation, what

would I expect? I would expect somebody to come running to help

me, take me out of our state situation, no matter who has to

say what, I really don't care. That's the kind of person I am. If

it's right, if something to do to help people, we go all out, and

eventually the same noises, people making the noises come out, and

after they say, thank you very much. I'm glad you touched on if

my wife or my daughter, my child, were in this situation, because

family is quite integral in the operations of gift of the givers.

Is it not? Yes. First of all, if you don't have the family support,

you can't what I do. You know, sometimes my wife calls with

absentee father. You know, she's, she's the very divorced lady kind

of stuff. And, you know, my kids sometimes don't talk to me for 20

days at a time, and I'm in the house because you're a workaholic.

I'm in the house and they tell me you are here, but you're not here

that kind of story. And if they didn't have the same spiritual

inclination, the same kind of thought processes or the same kind

of support. This work would have been very difficult, because, be

honest, to handle a disaster is easy for me, but to handle

conflict at home is not easy. So it's very important to have

equilibrium understanding and support of your family. How do

your family support you? First of all, they allow me to go. I mean,

I can just get on a plane with enough an hour I'm gone. I mean,

one morning I phoned home. I said, I'm in Joburg. I just went to

school. I jumped on and jumped on the plane. I went to Joburg. I

once left for Bosnia in 35 minutes. You know, things like

that, yeah. And they understand, because they understand what what

implications are and what spiritual teaching is all about.

It makes life very easy. But besides that, they're involved

with me in my work, my kids, my wife is heads the counseling

division of gift of the givers. My children said we want to do what

you do in our own time. What are some of the highlights when you

look back and you think to yourself, that was such a close

call. I didn't think we'd get out of that situation, or that was

such a huge achievement. I didn't think we'd get that far. What are

the most memorable events in your journey with gift of the givers, I

think two really stand out, one in Haiti and one in Syria. We sent

our first gift of the givers, own search and rescue team to Haiti,

and we made world history, because first time in the history of the

African continent, a search and rescue team from Africa pulled

somebody out of the earthquake, Rubble alive from the earthquake,

and this was eight days later.

It was a huge achievement to show to the world that Africa has its

place, that Africa can do something, and we carry the

message of Africa. The second big challenge was in Syria, when two

opposing rubble groups went into the hospital and started shooting

in the hospital, and my guys were in theater. I went under the table

and started teaching patients clothes. It was the fastest close

up in history, I think, of a patient, and the test was after

that. I said, Does anybody want to go home?

And they all looked at me and they said, we know this is fate driven.

They said, Whatever you do we follow? I said we stay. And

everybody put hand up and said, we stay. Do you have any fear that

there could be possible harm that comes to you or your team during

one of these dangerous operations? That is my biggest anxiety. I'm

not afraid to die for myself, but I'm afraid when I'm taking the

trust of wives, mothers, sisters, children, when I'm carrying all

these other members with me, and you know, I have to do everything

possible to make sure that they stay alive. It's risky. But they

come and they own this. They tell them. They tell me, we are adults.

We are people of faith. We know why we coming. We know we can die,

but we still want to come. It's a conscious, conscious decision,

decision we ourselves make, but still it's on your head

eventually, because you take the team in, it's a big burden to

carry, you know. And when those bombs fell inside, they were

* dangerous, you know. And I thought, oops, we're going to lose

something here today. And that's my only fear that I have, going

into a disaster zone. You speak of faith quite a lot. It's another

central theme here. How do you top it up? How do you refuel? Because

you're always on the go. There are always things to do, but there

comes a time when you have to come to that quiet place again, where

you refuel your own faith, tank fasting as well. Of it, you.

Top up in a fasting month, you are super conscious. You're eating

less, you know, morning and in evening. And while eating less,

you feel your soul gets nourished. You're not disturbed by a lot of

food. Your mind is clearer. You can reflect at night. We have

night prayers, which extends late into the night, which I spoke

about the doctor who mentioned, you know, who was near the Quran

Bihar, and those night prayers boost you. Then we have what is

called Big nights, special nights in the Islamic calendar, and you

stand up praying for the whole night, and then you have your

quiet moments. But you see, you can't live this in isolation.

You're dealing with human life. And the more you serve human life,

the more your faith grows. Because every time you serve somebody and

you bring somebody to somebody else, your faith grows. You cannot

live this in a vacuum. You can't say, Okay, I'm praying now and I'm

serving somebody else. It's two different things. It's not two

different things. Faith actually grows through service. So you more

yourself, the more you get refueled, and the more it drives

you. You know what? I'm not on the other side. I'm helping somebody

on the other side. And the more you make a difference to one

person's life, the more it fuels you, and you're driven, I have to

have this. Can you imagine a reality without gift of the

givers? I'd rather be dead, to be honest. There is no life without

gift of the givers. When your soul is and your mind and your body and

your spirit is in one, you take one of the elements away, you're

dead. You're a dead person. Rather be, you know, a dead person, than

to be walking like a zombie in the world, you have no sense of

purpose. Life is about purpose. It's not about money. It's about

purpose. And I found my purpose in life. Doc, I am very intrigued.

Now let's hold that thought for just a little moment, and when we

come back, we'll find out what Dr, mts Suleiman could possibly still

want to do over and above the exceptional work that gift of the

givers has already done. Stay with us.

Good evening to you once again, and if you've just joined us, a

warm welcome to visionaries lounge. We continue our discussion

with Dr MTS Suleiman, and we highlighted all your great

achievements through gift of the givers. Doc, but I do believe that

there are two things that you have yet to do that you've always

wanted to I have a sneaking suspicion that that garment next

to you has something to do with it. Tell us about that before I

come to the garment, let me dispense of something else.

All my life, I wanted to be a physician. I loved internal

medicine. I still have a passion for internal medicine. But

effectively, when the teacher said, You know what, this is an

instruction for you for the rest of your life, and I had to make a

choice between medicine and the deep work, I had to give up

medicine. So effectively, my dream to become an internal medicine

specialist or a physician was killed. But I accepted that the

second dream was not related to the spiritual teacher or to give

to the givers, to or to anything else. It was something personal.

It was came born out of Bruce Lee movies. I loved watching Bruce

Lee, and I always said to myself, one day, I'll be a black belt in

karate, the only black belt I have, the one that I'm wearing on

my pants, no, no black belt. But something strange happened. I was

invited to a karate function, and a karate master in South Africa,

guy called soli said, came to the podium, took out his belt, and he

said, my friend, this belt is what I've worn for the last so many

years, and said, This is what my master gave me. It's a fifth, then

Black Belt. And he said, What I hold dear in my heart, I am giving

to you because I hold dear the work of compassion that you do.

But not only am I giving you this belt, there were two American guys

with him. They said, We are now inducting you in the Hall of Fame

in America for martial arts. It's not the real thing. See, you got

an honorary Black Belt first. Then, okay, okay. But I said, Look

Me, I like to earn what my stripes. And I said, what I would

like to do is, when I come to Johannesburg, I like to come for

an hour or two to your dojo and do whatever training I can, but

Doctor, I have your book with me here today, and just going through

it and seeing some of the pictures and reading one or two of the

paragraphs there, I can't help but wonder what all of this has taught

you about yourself.

Well, it's shown me that I have lot of capacity. I have

capabilities. God has given many gifts. And I think what stands out

strongly, and that is reality. He is mainly compassionate, that

because you cannot do this without compassion, and if you not, you

cannot do that about yourself, then there's something wrong with

you. Yes, he's given me great compassion, and he's given me many

skills, and has given me a warm heart to watch people, and it's

taught me to be selfless, and it's taught me that the ego has no

place. In Kosovo, I had a man who was a multi millionaire, and he

came to me, he said, I'm now standing in the great queue. So it

could happen to the best of us. If you know how you want somebody to

respond to you, then you will do your best.

To respond to people in need, and always goes back to the teaching

respect the dignity of man. So when you do it, don't do it from

an ego position, from I'm the boss. I got the strain. I'm in

charge. You lower down, and I'm handing out to you. I'm in this

great position. I'm doing things so people know it must be done.

What humility, respecting the dignity in privacy, if possible,

maintaining the confidentiality of the people and doing it with love

and compassion. Again, ask yourself, how would you want

somebody to respond to you in that situation? What does the future

have in store for the next five to 10 years? I don't know. I don't

know. There is no plan. For 23 years, I've been working without

any plan, because it's driven by God Almighty, and for 23 years,

the plan hasn't failed. So I'm not going to ask for the next 23

years, what's going to happen. I look at you and I see passion, I

see drive, I see love, and I see someone who is genuine, but I

think to myself, if I were to dare to do what you have done, first

things, first feelings of great inadequacy would overwhelm me. Why

me? Why would God choose someone like me? Did you ever reach a

point you know, in your journey where you thought, I'm not worthy?

You do question yourself. You say, Look, you are a human being. You

have failings. Are you spiritually strong? Are you a righteous

person? Are you like a priest or an imam? Are you a rabbi or

somebody to that effect? How strong has God made you from a

spiritual point of view, are you flawless? And when you look at

yourself, you realize every human being has failings. If all of us

are going to think like that, nobody's going to do anything. So

that's out. You're never going to be perfect, but your perfection,

or your attempt to ditch perfection comes through service.

You've got to be realistic. I can't help the whole world. When I

go to a disaster zone, I can't help the whole country. Actually

can't even help the whole city. I may be able to help one street in

that whole city. So okay, I'm focused. I will help one street in

that city. We'll send such an SQ teams out. We'll be do primary

health care, and we'll do trauma medicine. We can do 50 patients a

day with the themes that we have, but we may save 50 lives a day. So

if you've made a difference to one person's life, imagine making a

difference to 50 people's lives every day for the next 10 days.

You got to be realistic, Doc, you have helped millions of people,

and yet I know that even if your efforts were for but one person,

it would have been more than enough. Thank you so much for

joining us this evening. I've thoroughly enjoyed our

conversation. I trust you have too. I know that I'm inspired. I

hope you are just as inspired. Let's do it all over again next

week, have yourself a fantastic evening

to achieve something in life requires determination, commitment

and self belief. God helps those who help themselves. Is a very

common statement. But have you ever done introspection? I give

you my own life story. I met a spiritual teacher by chance, a

spiritual teacher who gave me an instruction to serve all of

mankind. I followed that instruction with sincerity and

faith, and that sincerity and faith made me help millions of

people. Can you make a difference? Do you believe in yourself,

introspect and you will find the power within yourself. Do that

reflect and you will achieve miracles and move mountains. You