Is Silly Sanusi the Stupid not stooped in stupendous stupor? Hardly have the bombs of Boko Haram boomed away, ploughing through our pecuniary and poverty propelled police posses than that silly Sanusi comes up with his Terrorist Banking. Of course everything Islamic is now terrorist! Whether it makes sense or not.
Is Silly Sanusi the Stupid not stooped in stupendous stupor? Hardly have the bombs of Boko Haram boomed away, ploughing through our pecuniary and poverty propelled police posses than that silly Sanusi comes up with his Terrorist Banking. Of course everything Islamic is now terrorist! Whether it makes sense or not.
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That is why Jang the Fang, fresh from his rigging spree, wants to ban the call to prayer - that other act of Islamic terrorism that destroy the sleep of the
faithful and unfaithful early in the morning. Lucky some service personnel were wise enough to warn that we do not need another night of long knives, waving machetes from deranged Almajiri, baying like vampires for more of the blood of Jesus, His craven followers, are supposed to drink with his flesh.
Stereotypes. Northern and Southern stereotypes. Stupidity serenades the soft-headed with stereotypes of North and South; blinding flashes of religious and ethnic hatred that prevent both sides from seeing that they have more in common than they have apart. Hooked on the internet and facebook, digital boundaries unleashed across endless possibilities of communication and fantasy; yet geographically bound in their narrow parts of the Nigerian space. Wallowing in the squalor of half truths and half knowledge, our internet gurus succumb to the lowest common denominators of tragic platitudes and prejudices.
Through hues painted dark, in the narrow corners of tribal and religious minds, they see dark evil, where bright light beams, to save them from their own follies.
Like our single stories, told from our narrow points of view, and our group blames that commit murder and unleash genocide, our stereotypes are the seed, earth and fertiliser that bloom the harvest of prejudice.
As 8 year old Almajiri pupils become wanton killers of Southern Stereotypes, they reinforce single stories of wanton killers. Islam becomes the automatic religion of Taliban fields of blood. The blood soaked Americans become rabid saints that give us Rap, Jeans and Sordid Sex. The American holy killers who have buried thousands of Japanese, Vietnamese and Muslim Arabs with atomic bombs, napalm bombs and cluster bombs, come dripping in the scent of saints. The Americans who carted away 30 million slaves from the coast of West Africa, come dripping with the scents of saints.
Oh! The power of stereotypes, so powerful that when we see good we cannot understand it. And when we see evil, we embrace it with lustful desire, wreaking havoc through our warped senses of liberation.
Oh! The power of stereotypes, that a system which can verily save the ordinary man from the usury, the interest rates of Judaeo-Christian capitalism has been dubbed Terrorist banking.
But do you know what Islamic Banking is all about? Before you go up in arms and scream that the terrorists want to rape the last vestiges of your life, let’s find out.
In Christianity they call it USURY. In Judaism it is abhorred, yet USURY became the hallmark by which the stereotype of the evil Jew was adorned in Europe and led to pogrom after pogrom in which Christians repeatedly slaughtered Jews, till it culminated in Hitler and the holocaust of 6 million Jews, slaughtered on the altar of the other Christian God - that the Nazi’s claimed was the same God that the British, French and Americans worshipped – the God of the Jews.
In Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, Shylock the Jew, who wanted a pound of flesh for the money he loaned, was portrayed as the very personification of Jewish Stereotypes that persist till this day - that bloody, evil bloodsucker that lent money with interest to “honest” Christians. It is a common stereotype that the Igbo share with the Jews (whom some Igbo claim to descend from). Stereotypes, that like the Jews, led to the rest of Nigeria murdering 2 million Igbo in the Biafra genocide, and yet the other tribes feel no guilt, because they believed the Igbo were greedy, evil, blood suckers. Even the Germans wept and regretted the Jewish genocide. But Nigeria? Not
yet. The perpetrators create more illusions to justify their crimes.
Oh! The power of stereotypes. If the Igbo are not greedy traders, the Hausas and Fulani and mindless Almajiri on the Warpath, and the Yoruba are selfish owambe dancers salivating for the next oversized Ikebe. In our narrow worlds, even with the power of the internet, we do not
expand, we choose not to roam, but to seclude ourselves to the comfort of our little groups and territories in cyber space, from which we can abuse and evict alternative views, which we can embrace, understand and learn from, but nevertheless choose comfortable digital spaces
that merely reflect our physical geographical limitations.
But what is Islamic Banking. It means the bank takes a risk with you. In November 2008, the financial houses of America and Europe came crashing down because of interests that borrowers of mortgages for homes, could not afford. The people that lent them the money, who do not take loans themselves, had long gone with their profits. The poor people lost their homes, their jobs, etc. Lehman brothers, that heart of interest SIN, crashed with thousands of jobs lost. And in the ping pong that followed, like a pack of cards, the Nigerian stock market came crashing down.
Let us understand what Islamic banking is. It is a misnomer. A religious misnomer that tags the only way of lending, that makes sense, with some religious do’s and don’ts, and converts the most sensible way of lending money into what Southern Stereotypes see as Terrorist Banking.
Normal banking with interest is truly evil. These bankers trap you into borrowing money at fantastic rates you cant afford. They take all your profits, or worse still, they plunge you into debt that can plunge you into death. You doubt me? Check the statistics of those who committed suicide during the 2008-2009 world-wide financial meltdown.
What is Islamic Banking. Islamic Banking is Venture Capital – pure and simple. Go and google Venture Capital. It is Venture Capital that built Google, Facebook, Yahoo and all the other gizmos and gadgetry from America’s Silicon Valley. They were started by University students who had no money and who could not take loan from usurious, interest laden bankers. That was their saving grace. Venture Capital means people who put their money together, lend it to the businessman
and take a risk with the business man. If you make money, they share the profit with you according to the percentage they put in. If Nigerian banks had to do that, they will never lend you the money you don’t need and take interest off you. If the World Bank was based on Venture Capital, it means third world countries will not be paying all their money, to service the interest they owe, to banks in Europe and America.
The biggest crime that Silly Sanusi committed was calling it Islamic Banking. That is where his silliness stops. There is no way ordinary Western Bankers in the other Nigerian Banks will agree to the humanity of sharing profits and losses with the person you lend money. Why?
Because it makes them more honest and responsible. For now, once they get your house as collateral, they can give you any amount of money for any stupid idea you have, with the ruthless intention to take your money and your house from you with interests. Venture Capital funding
will never lend money to a fool. If you fail, they fail with you. If you succeed, they succeed with you and share your profits. It makes bankers much more responsible, and it protects the borrower from tragedy.
Once Islamic Banking or Venture Capital enters the Nigerian market, it will overtake the ordinary banks, because it is more customer friendly, and will free you from the evil interest rates of Nigerian banks.
Oh. The Evil of Stereotypes! All this makes me think of the blind rejection of Sharia. Allow people to follow their religions and the religious courts they wish to be judged under. Right now, Nigerian Law is based on British Common Law which was originally Christian Cannon (Church Law) Law. Muslims were forced to submit to it by the British Empire. Christians say Sharia cuts of people’s hands. Yes its literal application does that. But let’s put it in context. Today, cutting the hands of a thief will seem draconian, but in 6th Century AD Islam, cutting the hands of a thief was an act of kindness in an age of swords and ruthless, evil kings. At the time, from Europe to Asia, there were hideous ways of killing thieves - burning, dungeons, beheading – and the terrible drawn, hung and quartered - thieves were drawn by horses pulling from either ends till their bones popped from their joints, then pulled by horses till almost dead, then hung up for the City to see, then when they died were cut in four pieces.
Prophet Mohammed (SAW) introduced hand cutting in Sharia as an act of kindness, and increased the degree of proof required, as in the case of adultery before stoning, which is very difficult to prove. But the Truth is we are no longer in the 6th Century AD and Islam needs to
update to what the Prophet Mohammed (SAW) would have done if he were here today. In other words Islam should get more imaginative, follow the Heart of the Prophet and ask: What if the Prophet was here today, how would he have responded? as opposed to an Arabia of ruthless murderous kings that wanted to destroy the Prophet and his message.
So perhaps Silly Sanusi is not as silly as we want to make him out. He should stop calling it Islamic Banking and call it Venture Capital banking – then it is up to Muslims and Christians to use a more humane banking system, to decide whether or not, to invest in Pork, Halal Meat or Digital Fantasies.
Oh! The Danger of Stereotypes!!
Single stories
Killing glories
Group Blames
Fan flames
Deadly Stereotypes
That evil hypes
We revel in possession
Claiming with passion
You and yours
Me and mine
Boundaries and Lines
Laced with mines
Of hates and shames
Burning in flames
I am not a Northerner. I am not a Southerner. The Truth has no tribe or religion. The Truth is Neutral. The Truth is Deadly. But the Truth shall set us free.
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