BURNING ISSUES

Islamic Banh

The Heat, The Noise And The Light

On The Engaging Subject.
- A Correspondent
igeria is suddenly crawling with
fanatics and fundamentalists of
all religious hues. There is so
much rancour and rabid hate in the land
one begins to suspect that some people
are working towards a predetermined
agenda to terminate the existence of the
nation. As if the scourge of Boko Haram,
the minimum wages palaver, tenure
elongation rumours, the arrival of
monsoon- like flooding and the general
insecurity o f life and property are not
enough, we have now added the
dangerous controversy over Islamic Bank
to the combustible cocktail.

This column has had cause to defend

Sanusi Lamido Sanusi in the past,
particularly against vested interests bent
on frustrating his appointment. In a
kleptocracy, it is impossible to be a
decent Central Bank Governor without
stepping on toes. Where the incumbent
is driven by a missionary and messianic

Lamido Sanusi

zeal it is bound to be war in Babylon: a

stridently agocistk m J h ;n which no
hostages are taken. Sanusi does not step
cm toes. He crushes toes, sending his

adversaries hobbling about in

excruciating pains.
But toes can be crushed without gleefully
counting the remaining for the owners.
This is where Sanusi's personal
comportment becomes a problem. In the
past, we have had cause to caution
Sanusi against a resort to excessive
histrionics and grandstanding in the
course o f what is otherwise an honorable
and noble mission. Hell-raising and
hysteria-mongering are incompatible
with regulatory banking at its most
rarified level. It is not for nothing that
bankers are seen and perceived to be
traditionally conservative; always soberly
besuited and evincing a dour impassivity
o f outlook. Like pilots even scary
turbulence, they must project a
becalming mien even while
taking out of the ordinary
decisions.
It does seem as if Sanusi is
sometimes more driven by
media melee and attentionseeking than actual results;
more forsworn to giddy and
gaudy showmanship than
real substance. The catalogue
of political indiscretions in a
delicately poised nation
prone to centrifugal forces is
truly amazing. In an attempt
to reform and sanitize the
banking sector, Sanusi stands
the risk of fatally endangering
him self and the country by
his hubris. If anybody would
be pleased by those
prospects, it is those who
have turned banking in
Nigeria to a vastly criminal
enterprise.
The problem is not Islamic
Banking. The most terrible
thing about the advent of
Islamic Banking is the timing.

N e w s g ra in

Magazine

Dr. Okonjo Iw eala

Coming at a time o f dangerous

polarization of the nation along religious
and ethnic lines, it has now added a
frenzied volatility and incendiary
prospects to an already combustible
situation. Suddenly, it is either you are
an obliging Muslim fanatic or an
objecting Christian fundamentalist
without a pan-Nigerian middle ground,
and without a thought for millions of
Nigerians who still worship at the shrine
of their ancestral deities. There are
legions stoking the fire either out of
criminal m ischief or mischievous
ignorance.
The most elementary factor ignored by
proponents and opponents of Islamic
Banking alike is the fact that its ideal
habitat is a Sharia-compliant society.
W ithout the teachings of the Koran and
the Hadith to enforce its theological
injunctions, Islamic Banking is a fish out
o f water. Its hatred o f Riba or interest
banking, its preference for profitsharing, its aversion for speculative
gambling based on economic gaming