Acceptance Speech of IDB Group President, H.E. Dr. Ahmad Mohamed Ali. for. The Honorary Doctorate Degree Insaniah University, Malaysia

Transcription

1 Acceptance Speech of IDB Group President, H.E. Dr. Ahmad Mohamed Ali for The Honorary Doctorate Degree Insaniah University, Malaysia Langkawi, Kedah, Malaysia October 28, 2011 His Royal Highness. The SULTAN of KEDAH. The Right Honourable Dato' Seri Ustaz Azizan Abdul Razak. The Menteri Besar of KEDAH. His Highness The TUNKU TEMENGGUNG of KEDAH His Excellency Dato Wira. Dr. Jamil Osman, Rector of INSANIAH. Excellencies Ladies and Gentlemen. 1

2 Let me start by expressing, on behalf of the Islamic Development Bank Delegation, our deepest gratitude for His Royal Highness the Sultan and the People of Kedah for the warm welcome and the generous hospitality we were graced with since our arrival in this beautiful Island. I am deeply honored to be conferred the Honorary degree of Doctorate by the Insaniah University. At the outset, this recognition is appreciably, a recognition of your institution, the Islamic Development Bank (IDB). Today, in the audience of the distinguished leadership of Malaysia, allow me, on behalf of the IDB Group, to humbly submit my profound appreciation to the people and Government of Malaysia, for their leading role in the establishment of the IDB itself, particularly the Son of this State, Kedah, the 1 st Prime Minister of Malaysia, Allahyarham His Highness Tunku Abdul Rahman, who you may know has chaired and presided the team that has been assigned the task of establishing the IDB. With his wisdom Allayarhamu, the team was able to craft the Articles of Agreement of IDB, which remain even more relevant today. Malaysia is blessed with a stream of foresighted and determined leadership, turning Malaysia to a global reference brand. Again, another son of the state of Kedah, H.E. Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamed, the 4 th Prime Minister Malaysia spearheaded Malaysia through the industrial age into the Information Age. Insightful Leadership, no doubt, is a necessary condition for growth and prosperity. Although many in Malaysia may take the achievements of Malaysia today, for granted, to many people outside of Malaysia, it was a sort of miracle. The key trait of statesmanship, by putting the goal of the Ummah and the Community ahead of oneself and family, is much needed today, if we 2

3 are to regain human dignity. The IDB Group is also benefiting from the wisdom of Dr Mahathir, as he spearheaded the formulation of the IDB Group Vision 1440 Hijrah or A Vision of Dignity for the Ummah. Realizing this collective vision requires us to enhance the leadership quality of the Ummah. Allayarham Tunku Abdul Rahman helped in laying the foundation of IDB, and H.E. Tun Dr. Mahathir helped craft the future of IDB Group in this new world order. This Honorary Doctorate therefore, is also a recognition for the leadership and people of this Great State of Kedah. I remember clearly, the proposed formation of IDB in the early 1970s that was full of obstacles and skepticism. After all, in the 1970s a new world order was underway, when the US decided to no longer commit to a gold-backed currency. 40 years down the road, today we are witnessing how that unilateral decision, has profoundly changed the world. The world is now trying to deal with that change, perhaps with a new world order in the making. In this day of the network age, the impact of any decision can easily spread at a global scale in shorter time. In my years of experience, to remain relevant we must learn to expect increasing complexity, shorter time span for decision making, and wisdom to lead with a long term perspective. In the 1970s and 1980s, operating in full compliance with Shari ah principles and being sincere to the population of its constituency, were considered impracticable, at least within the sphere of the traditional economic theory and its adheres. Some writers at that time questioned the viability of a 3

4 financial institution operating according to the Shariah Principles. Those writers speculated that IDB will vanish after exhausting its resources accruing from the boom in oil prices in the early 1970s. Alhamdulillah, IDB succeeded not only in proving its viability but has achieved a AAA rating in the last ten years by almost all the three major international rating agencies: Standard and Poor's, Moody's and Fitch. As a matter of fact, two weeks ago Standard and Poor's has confirmed the IDB AAA rating for the tenth consecutive year. Last month, Moody's has also confirmed IDB's AAA rating and Fitch is expected to follow suit in the few coming days at a time where a number of the most famous financial institutions have been downgraded. IDB's total financing has exceeded USD 75 billion since its inception. Furthermore, IDB has been a pioneer in promoting Islamic banking and finance by nurturing the enabling environment for Islamic economics and finance to flourish and incubating the institutional setup to expand. With the support of the Member Countries, we had the courage to incubate new institutions like AIOFI, CIBAFI and IFSB. These institutions collectively strengthen IDB Group too. Now the practicability and merits of Islamic economics and finance are widely recognized worldwide, especially after the advent of the persistent global financial crises has revealed that Islamic Financial Institutions have proven their comparative resilience to these crises. In fact, after the recent financial crisis, IDB has received a huge number of requests for assistance not only from member countries, but also from non-member countries from Europe including UK, France, Spain, Italy and others. Not only that, but some European institutions intend to practice some modes of Islamic financing. During World Bank Annual Meeting in Washington last month, the French Development Agency asked the IDB delegation to cooperate in having a joint 4

5 line of financing to microfinance projects in Tunisia on Islamic financing principles. In Conclusion, I have learned that, we need to also spread success, for our own success. In shaping the culture of the IDB Group, we choose to listen more than preaching, cooperating and not imposing, and approaching our work with humbleness and sincerity against the temptation for forcing quick win showcase. With this humbleness, we strive to serve the people in need, where others choose to shy away. IDB Group, as an institution of the Ummah, have been with the people of Palestine serving the unserved people. This lead the Arab Summit to assign the management of the Alaqsa and Alquds funds to IDB when they were established. The GCC countries also selected IDB to manage the Gaza Reconstruction Fund established in 2009 after the Israeli aggression on Gaza. One of the successful programs implemented by IDB with the cooperation of the Palestinian Authority and UNDP is the Deprived Families Economic Empowerment Program that has succeeded in supporting more than 7000 families, thereby enhancing their economic independence and their ability to stick and hold to their homeland. IDB Group has been with the people of Somalia since the early 1990s, despite the lack of effective government. IDB Group was and continues to support the people of Libya, Egypt and Tunisia. IDB Group, learned to serve with sincerity to gain the trust of its Member States and the people. We must strive to include the excluded. 5

6 As we grow the IDB Group, we also have to learn how to manage success. The downside risk is that, we can easily find ourselves thinly stretched. As we reflect every day to choose the expanding demand for our services and rising expectations, we find that IDB Group cannot be selective, except to serve the need of all. This may sound impractical to the modern management school of thoughts, but, to IDB Group it is a value proposition on which IDB Group and its constituency believe in it with full conviction. We see the expanding demand as a positive sign of progress of the Ummah and an opportunity and a challenge for us to respond effectively. Therefore, by design and with the help of Almighty Allah SWT, IDB Group shall not be complacent, turning this challenge to an opportunity for IDB Group, as a duty, to serve the Ummah. We live with the proverb ال ي درك كله فال ي ترك جل ه, ما translated roughly as if you cannot do it all, then do the maximum you can. I have spoken about the past. I believe that, to help us know where we are heading, we should know where we have been before. Now allow me to share a bit about the future, as I see it from the Ummah perspective. I would like to conjecture 3 key strategic and urgent global trends that we need to manage for our advantage: 1. Young and growing population and their consequential intra-generational demand or needs; 2. The speed of quality technology & innovation and their transformation impacts; and 3. Sustainable resource management and their utilization (including water, energy, environment, etc). If not properly managed, I fear that we are increasing the divide between the have and have not with a real potential of crisis of humankind in the making, risking all they have worked 6

7 hard to gain over the years. In sum, the challenges of the next generation are going to be more complicated to comprehend, yet the solution can be simple. We need to go back to our roots of comprehensive human development for which Maqasid Al Shariah can guide our development approach and its ensuing framework. We need collective leadership to steer the Ummah, working beyond our traditional boundaries, to promote human-centric development. We need to nurture global leadership for human dignity. Despite the many crises facing different parts of the Muslim world today, I believe, the Muslim world is now emerging to new horizons as demonstrated just last week by the statements of the Libyan leadership and the elections in Tunisia. Indeed, the Ummah is at another crossroad to trigger another push to regain its dignity. I have much confidence on the next generation to assume leadership and embrace global change. We must allow them the space to lead, as it is our duty to leave them with a strong foundation to build on. We must engineer a design and a roadmap to ensure leadership continuity. Your Highness, Brothers and Sisters, I wish to express IDB Group sincere congratulations to His Royal Highness the Sultan of Kedah for his leadership and wisdom to establish and steer Insaniah University as an institution for the Ummah, with programs not just for the people of Kedah and Malaysia, but also the Muslim Communities in the region. On behalf of the Ummah, I want to express to Your Highness and to the People of the State of Kedah and Malaysia, our deepest gratitude for the sincere efforts and valuable contributions benefiting Muslim Communities in a number of areas, especially in the area of education which will enable these 7

8 communities to develop and preserve their entity and contribute actively in the development of their respective countries. The IDB will be very happy to support this very important initiative of Insaniah University to extend its services to the Muslim Communities in the region such as Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. IDB will provide scholarships to Muslim students from these communities to study in the branches of Insaniah University in these countries. IDB will also be happy to join Islamic Banks to jointly finance commercial buildings on Waqf lands in these countries in order to generate additional income to support branches of Insaniah University in those countries. IDB Group is also very thankful to the leadership of Chief Minister of Kedah H.E. Dato Seri Azizan and H.E. Dato Dr Jamil, Rector of Insaniah for inviting IDB and IRTI to collaborate in this nobel effort. As you may know, IDB is mandated not only to serve the 56 Member Countries but also the Muslim Communities all over the world. Alhamdulliah with the strong support of the Member Countries, IDB has been able to provide assistance to Muslim Communities in more than 30 non-member countries from the Far East, Asia, Europe, Africa, North America and Latin America. Indeed, the need of the Muslim Communities all the over world is not addressed comprehensively. In fact, the potential of this community is not well understood. I am indebted to the His Royal Highness, The Sultan of Kedah, The Government of Malaysia, The Government of Kedah and Insaniah University for addressing the developmental needs of the Muslim Communities in the region. We need to live and practice Solidarity of the Ummah. May Allah reward you justly for this nobel deed. 8

9 With the signing of an agreement with Insaniah, I am confident, it will further strengthen our partnership with Insaniah to serve the Ummah better and more collectively. As a matter of fact, IDB gives a special importance to its close cooperation with Insaniah University and the new Agreement on the Implementation of the e-learning Master's degree that we will be signing will strengthen this cooperation and alleviate it to new horizons in promoting Islamic Economics, Banking and Finance. It will also enhance the pioneering role that Malaysia plays in this area. I humbly submit that the IDB Group will carry on its mission, as the development institution of the Ummah, to serve the future generation better. I humbly accept this honor. 9