KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Islamic Chamber of Commerce (MICC) urges the government to provide at least one digital bank license to enable establishing a digital waqf bank owned by any national wakaf institutions.
Its president Mohammad Sahar Mat Din, said the effort to create a digital wakaf bank is important to drive the involvement of Muslims in the high-tech financial system.
"For this purpose, MICC urges the government to provide a special allocation of at least one Syariah-compliant digital bank license to enable the establishment of a digital waqf bank.
"The merger of waqf management with digital banking will definitely start a new reformation in the practice of waqf, and this will help to achieve the full potential of waqf as the third economy in the Islamic economic system.
"These ambitions cannot be achieved without the political will from the prime minister and the minister of finance who have the authority to approve this license application," he said in a statement.
Mohammad Sahar said the digital waqf bank would help produce basic Shariah-compliant digital banking services such as deposit savings and loan services.
He said banks could gain access to assets and property as a source of capital and deposits for investment purposes and utilise its benefit without compromising the rights and ownership of each member, where the rewards and benefits can be enjoyed at all times.
"Banks can use waqf assets/property to engage in property development, commercial and e-business ventures that can generate higher returns," he said.
Furthermore, he said digital banking is expected to bring change to the global banking and financial landscape.
"The proposed digital waqf bank system would ensure the stability of the financial system through waqf institutions that use resources that do not have a long maturity period.
"By maximising the existing resources of Islamic finance talent and expertise in Malaysia in the areas of management, finance, investment, technology, risk management and shariah compliance, can help to sustain the growth of waqf investment into a higher level," he added.