By Uche Ezechukwu 0803 622 3337 [email: onukwube1@yahoo.com]
Monday, July 04, 2011
First and foremost, I must apologize to my readers for not bringing the concluding part of the piece I started last week on the Nigeria Police. I had to postpone it because of some developments in the polity, which, as I sincerely believe, have the potential of ballooning into untoward outcomes, if not promptly addressed. I stumbled on a story in the online edition of the Vanguard and which bothered me greatly and should bother other Nigerians of conscience.
The story in question was that the Delta State chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), led by its chairman, Archbishop God-do-well Avwomakpa, marched through the major streets of Warri last Thursday, protesting the authorization of Islamic banking by the CBN in the country. The story further highlighted the interview granted by the bishop during which he reportedly declared that the introduction of Islamic banking in the country was a prelude to the Islamization of the country. He was further quoted as saying that “the church is aware of the dangers that this issue is going to cause and we are not going to compromise our faith as Christians. Nigeria belongs to all of us and we are saying ‘No’ to Islamization of Nigeria.”
Before I go further, I insist that from what I know of the universal Catholic Church to which I belong and which is the largest denomination of CAN, the Delta chairman could not have been speaking for us, not even for the Catholics and the other orthodox communions in that state, because I know the channels of our communication and our church does not engage in rabble-rousing.
Again, I must blame the CBN for its culpable assumption that the Islamic banking system which has been in operation in many more advanced and more secular countries like UK, USA, France, South Africa, etc, without affecting or altering the lifestyle or secularity of those societies, could be introduced into Nigeria without adequate enlightenment. It was an unpardonable miscalculation which has enabled both the little informed and outright mischievous elements in our midst to seek undeserved relevance by misinforming Nigerians on the whys and wherefores of the system which has found acceptance in the places where it has been in practice.
Having said that, it is rather unfortunate that in these days when knowledge and information are at the beck and call of all, it is a great disservice for some people in privileged positions to indulge in outright falsification of issues that are capable of causing social dislocation especially if the correct sides of the case are not accurately and dispassionately presented. For the avoidance of doubt, it is obvious that those leaders who are leading their followers to believe that the Islamic banking system would Islamize the polity, should have also recalled that the many Christian universities that have been licensed by the NUC as businesses and bearing such explicit names and Catholic University, etc, have not been accused of Christianizing the polity. For, how can a business concern which does not exercise any coercive authority over any of his customers, make its customers to adopt its beliefs?
And why has the CBN which has exercised the responsibility to regulate and provide guidelines for all other forms of banking operations: commercial, merchant, community, micro, mortgage, etc, in the past, should now become culpable because it also produced guidelines for the establishment and operation of the Islamic interest-free banking system, which is another banking format? For even when those banks take off, it is not likely they would have the word “Islamic” prefixed to their names. And even if they did, would it not be similar to the many businesses owned by the different faith-based organisations?
Yes, a mischievous mind might find it convenient to manipulate the emotive sentiments of religion to draw attention to him or herself, but that fact should not remove the fact that the introduction of any system that would bring about some salutary influences into our economy should be welcome. Yes, the Islamic banking system seeks to run its banks along the Islamic jurisprudence – simply put, along the prescription of the Sharia laws.
The most prominent feature of the Islamic banking is in the absence of interests (riba) in accordance of the Koranic prohibition of usury. Significantly, the Jewish code or the Torah (the Old Testament of the Bible) is also against usury. And if their religion demands that a Muslim’s life should be ordered along the dictates of the Sharia, should the Muslims who constitute half of the national population be denied the type of banking institution that caters for their religious belief? As a Nigerian, is the Muslim not entitled to the unfettered practice of his religion?
The proposed Islamic banks would be privately owned and not by the government and such specialised financial institutions would be expected run their businesses along the dictates of the guidelines setting them up, which is mainly that, anybody who agrees to abide by those codes would be welcome to do business with them. How would their operations affect anybody who does not patronize them? So, what is the cause of all these needless hues and cries which are more out of mischief than culpable ignorance?
The ownership of banks like other businesses, as schools, is totally deregulated but run under set-down guidelines by the relevant laws and regulations. Many Christian-based organisations have applied for and were licensed by the appropriate authorities to run schools and universities. Even though these academic institutions have the greater capacity of influencing those who pass through their portals, their existence or sectarian ownership has never been challenged by any quarters – Christian or Muslim. The universities and colleges throw their gates open to all those who agree to abide by their ordinances and prescriptions as nobody is, ab initio, never coerced into enrolling into them.
For instance, Muslim students who attend Catholic schools alongside my daughters, while being allowed to observe their Islamic faith, are nevertheless compelled to obey the basic demands of Christian life, which they had been made aware of before being enrolled.
So, I as a Catholic decide to patronize an Islamic bank, I should have become aware that the Sharia demands that I cannot expect the bank to grant me loans to run businesses that are haram to the Islamic faith. For instance, I cannot expect to obtain a loan from there to run a newspaper that would advertize alcoholic beverages or pork products. In the same way, I cannot expect to obtain a loan from an Islamic bank to run gambling operations or hotels that peddle alcohol or operate a brothel. More importantly, these banks do not put a gun on my head to use their services, nor would they turn me away because I am not a Muslim, provided I sign up to adhere to its provisions. How, therefore, could one branch of an Islamic bank at Onitsha, Aba or Enugu have the capacity to Islamize the Igbo society?
Having provided these rudimentary facts on the Islamic banking, it then becomes unfortunate that anybody or group should want to over-heat the polity because of the introduction of a banking system that has absolutely no adverse effect on the society, both on the short and long run. One would have thought that if there are Christian leaders who feel envious that banks are established along Islamic religious codes, they should hasten to establish their own variants which would use their enormous riches garnered though huge tithes and offerings of the millions of their adherents. After all, recent studies by a reputed international publication named four Nigerian pastors as among the richest in the world. Such a move which could provide the much hankered-after economic succour to their long-basic demands of Christian life, which they had been made aware of before being enrolled. So, I as a Catholic decide to patronize an Islamic bank, I should have become aware that the Sharia demands that I cannot expect the bank to grant me loans to run businesses that are haram to the Islamic faith. For instance, I cannot expect to obtain a loan from there to run a newspaper that would advertize alcoholic beverages or pork products. In the same way, I cannot expect to obtain a loan from an Islamic bank to run gambling operations or hotels that peddle alcohol or operate a brothel. More importantly, these banks do not put a gun on my head to use their services, nor would they turn me away because I am not a Muslim, provided I sign up to adhere to its provisions. How, therefore, could one branch of an Islamic bank at Onitsha, Aba or Enugu have the capacity to Islamize the Igbo society?
It would be necessary at this juncture to insist that the religious leaders – Christian and Muslim – should desist from misleading their followers by inciting them against fellow Nigerians who adhere to different faiths through half baked instructions which are often programmed to produce less than godly objectives. I do not know what punishment Islam prescribes for such serious misdemeanours but I know that Jesus Christ, whom I profess, prescribes that such people deserve to have big boulders of stone tied around their necks and dumped into the depth of the ocean.
Moreover, God says in the Bible that, “my people perish for lack of knowledge” It is, therefore, sinful for any religious leader to hide the truth from his followers; it is even worse for him to manipulate the ignorance of such followers.
At the end of the end of the day, who is really afraid of this Islamic banking? Is it those on whose consciences it weighs heavily? Actually, a true Christian should not fight against any trend which he thinks that threatens his faith, because as we are told, if it is of God, nothing can stop it, but if not, it will self-destruct and fade away. The greatest proof of that is Communism which raged worldwide like an all-consuming fire only to die as it had started, unsung, less than a century later.
Nigeria belongs to all of us – and it is in God’s wisdom that he put both Christians and Muslims into his space, for cohabitation. Let us not play God, but always give peace a chance. That,to my understanding is the cardinal tenet of Christianity – to live and to let live.
Source:http://sunnewsonline.com/webpages/columnists
