DOCUMENTING THE SUCCESS STORIES OF OMANI ACHIEVERS

To honour the achievers of Oman, an Omani volunteering team launched a new initiative known as ‘Injazat Shabab Oman’ that documents the achievements of the Omanis.

The initiative was founded by Munther Al Mamari, an SQU graduate who studied Economics and Political Science and had a passion for meeting and exploring the lives and times of his fellow Omanis who brought pride to the nation.

His love for archiving began in college where he formed a student group consisting of his friends and released a universityspecial book titled Book of Innovations and Student Achievements that shed light on college students who had successful and victorious journeys.

After graduation, Munther decided to follow his passion and expand the group.

After expanding his team and gaining a following on social media, he launched a 300-page book under the same title Injazat Oman. The book is an extensive archive that documents achievements of Omanis from around the Sultanate, released in January 2017. Munther and his team gathered information from a variety of fields to deliver a one of a kind collectible that represents Oman to its core.

Fields such as education, engineering, science, politics, and the arts are included, among others.

“We constantly witness Omanis achieve great things locally and internationally, and these achievements are then seen on newspapers for a day, social media for a day, and TV for another day, but there is no reference. So why don’t we collect these achievements and put them in a book?” he said.

The book has more than 11 sections, and over 1,450 international achievements made by 654 Omanis, and collected and documented from July 2013 to December 2014.

“Our goal is to shed light on the Omani success stories, and to share knowledge and inspire the young generation, especially kids at school,” said Munther, adding that “everyone must have a role model who inspires them, and learn from their experiences and challenges.”

The lack of archiving facilities for such stories was a challenge for Munther, but he managed to contact more than 800 organisations, companies, and people to document their journeys and collect photos.

Currently, they are working on their second book which documented stories that took place in 2015 and 2016, which is believed to have a total of about 900 Omani achievers.

Given the time-consuming process that goes into making a single issue, each book will be released every two years and distributed to schools and libraries around the country.

Apart from publishing books, Injazat Shabab Oman holds activities on a regular basis, including live talks with inspirational figures who share their experiences, as well as social media programmes such as Youth TV which is a short 1-minute video that explores Omani achievers and their stories.

And, the team is working on launching an online database that will be a one-stop-shop for all Omani achievers from 1970.