Binh Thuan leaders visit Cham Bani community on Ramuwan festival

Binh Thuan (VNA) – Leaders of the central province of Binh Thuan on May 14 visited a local community of Cham Bani people on the occasion of the community’s traditional Ramuwan festival.

During their visits to Bac Binh, Tuy Phong, and Ham Thuan Bac districts, provincial leaders wished the Muslim community a happy and warm festival.

Acknowledging the ethnic group’s contributions to great national unity and local socio-economic development, they hoped that dignitaries and the entire community will continue promoting their valuable traditions, supporting each other in reducing poverty and participating in new-style rural area building programmes in their localities.

On behalf of the group, Cham Bani dignitaries expressed their gratitude for the support of local authorities for Cham Muslims’ celebration of Ramuwan festival.

They said they hope to receive more assistance from provincial authorities for the community’s business development.

Like the Kinh community during the Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday, the Cham Bani use the Ramuwan festival as an opportunity to visit home and gather with their families to pay tribute to their ancestors and pray for happiness, bumper crops, and peace.

The festival begins with a visit to ancestral cemeteries, during which Cham Bani families go to cemeteries to cleanse and decorate the graves and invite their ancestors back home for Ramuwan.

Others rituals held during this period are the Va Ha festival, ancestor worshipping at home, and the Ramadan month when many Muslims do not eat or drink between sunrise and sunset.

Binh Thuan is currently home to 41,000 ethnic Cham people, including more than 15,000 Muslims or the Cham Bani.–VNA