Rejecting Merger Of Bank Muamalat And BTN Syariah, MUI: Only Profit Entrepreneurs

Bank Muamalat (Between)

JAKARTA - Deputy Chairperson of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) as well as Social and Religious Observer Anwar Abbas rejected the plan to merge or merge Bank Muamalat Indonesia (BMI) with BTN Syariah.

He also highlighted the portion of financing to MSMEs from Bank Muamalat and BTN Syariah. According to him, the merger will only benefit big entrepreneurs and harm MSMEs.

"I firmly state that I do not agree with the merger because it will clearly benefit big entrepreneurs/owners of capital/conglomerates and oligarchs and only be a little profitable for MSMEs," said Anwar in a statement received by VOI, Monday, February 19.

Therefore, Anwar admitted that he wanted Bank Muamalat to survive with his philosophy as a bank belonging to the people and for the people. According to him, the improvement of Bank Muamalat can also be done without the merger.

"For that I want BMI (Bank Muamalat Indonesia) to survive with his identity as a bank that has a philosophy and paradigm of the people, together with the people, belonging to the people and to the people," he said.

Anwar explained that the large-scale market share of banks generally targets financing to large businesses. Seeing the portion of the financing, 70 percent of the financing has realized 5,550 business actors. Meanwhile, the remaining 30 percent have only targeted 65 million MSME actors.

"My conclusion is that this is not unfounded. The basis is the mandate from BI to the banking world so that in 2024 at least 30 percent of credit and financing from the banking world must be disbursed to MSMEs. We know that the business world in this country is only divided into two, namely large businesses and MSMEs," he said.

Bank Muamalat Rescue Option

According to Anwar, there are other options if the context is to save Bank Muamalat's financial condition. The option in question is strengthening in Bank Muamalat's management. For example, by placing people who are considered competent.

Anwar said that the qualifications of these people must be in favor of the MSME group. With this step, he said, it is hoped that there will be a movement of Bank Muamalat in the future who will prioritize MSMEs.

"For improving BMI's performance in the future, the existing BMI management (such as) Commissioners, Directors and positions at one level below must be completely overhauled and handed over to people who have been used to dealing with small, micro and ultra micro businesses," he said.

According to Anwar, finding and getting people who can support this idea is clearly not difficult because in this country many people have succeeded in empowering the lower class of society.

"Is it from BMT/BTM, capital ventures of sharia, PNM Syariah and others whose efforts really seem to defend the small people," he said.

Anwar assessed that if this could be done, there would be a structural change. For example, there is massive vertical mobility from the lower class to the middle class.

"So that the number of our middle class from year to year will get bigger and bigger so that the shape of our business world in the future will no longer be like fire, but it is like division," he said.

For your information, Bank Muamalat Indonesia itself was founded on the ideas of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI), the Indonesian Muslim Cendikiawan Association (ICMI) and Muslim entrepreneurs. This plan also received support from the Indonesian government.