A former Chief Executive Officer of Stanbic Bank, Naa Alhassan Andani, has appealed to stakeholders in the Muslim communities to provide financial support for the establishment of an Islamic Bank to address the financial needs of all Muslims.
He said the call for the establishment of the bank had become necessary as a lot of Muslim entrepreneurs and individuals continued to undergo financial challenges which were hindering their standard of living.
MrAndani made the appeal last week Saturday at this year’s Ramadan Islamic Finance forum organised by the Islamic Finance Research Institute Ghana (IFRIG) in Accra.
IFRIG is a registered institution with the main aim of carrying out Islamic finance research, training, information, advisory, technical assistance and development of Islamic financial products and services within Ghana and beyond.
The forum, which brought together various scholars in the Muslim communities, was to ensure participants gained knowledge about Islamic banking.
Mr Andani said Islamic bank provided products based on Islamic principles to meet the financialneeds of Muslims, stressing “this will provide flexible financial services to the unemployed especially to become entrepreneurs”.
He noted that it would cost about GH₵400 million to meet the financial obligations of the Central Bank before the establishment of the Islamic Bank.
Such an amount, he stressed demanded the collaboration of resources from wealthy Muslims to invest into the establishment of the bank to enable it become reality.
He stressed that the establishment of the Islamic bank was not meant to serve and meet the needs of Muslims but all faith-based organisations which included Christians.
The Director General of IFRIG, MrShaibu Ali, said there had been progress towards the establishment of the Islamic Bank, stressing an application for license had been submitted to the Bank of Ghana.
He added that staff of the Central Bank had also undergone training on Islamic banking as well as some Imams to afford them the opportunity to understand and appreciate the operations of Islamic banking.
BY BERNARD BENGHAN