Omar Sheikh

Islamic bank pushes for regulation review

The laws regulating Islamic financing in Kenya need fine tuning to fully support sharia compliant banking, First Community Bank general manager Omar Sheikh has said. At the moment there is no double taxation for the murabaha contracts but the law ought to be clear on this matter for future operations. Sheikh also cited the loss sharing principle as a matter that creates confusion in terms of declaration and their accounting statements whereby while sharia law requires that profit and loss be shared among the bank and clients, the local industry's guidelines require that they record it as loss provision in their books. Sheikh urged non Muslims to also seek services at the bank adding that wrong perception that the lender is restricted to Muslim clients has been the biggest challenge to its growth.

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