REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- The leadership of the Central (PP) of Muhammadiyah is now focusing on strengthening the units of the Sharia People's Finance Bank (BPRS) that it had before thinking about setting up a sharia public bank (BUS). This was conveyed by the Chairman of PP Muhammadiyah Buya Anwar Abbas.

He admitted that the Syrian government plans to form a large sharia public bank. However, his current priority is to manage Muhammadiyah's BPRS, which numbersclose to 20 banks.

“We are trying to restructure the existing BPRS so that it can develop into a sharia public bank,” said Buya Anwar Abbas when he met at the Ijtima Sanawi event of the Sharia Supervisory Board 2024 in Jakarta, Friday (11/10/2024).

Muhammadiyah realized that a number of these BPRs require improvement in order to function optimally and synergistically. The move is expected not only to improve service to customers, but also to strengthen Muhammadiyah's position in the sharia banking ecosystem in Indonesia.

By encouraging competition, according to Buya Anwar, Muhammadiyah hopes to help accelerate the growth of a healthy and sustainable sharia banking sector. By strengthening the BPRS first, the Syarikatan can create a strong foundation to support the establishment of a larger sharia bank in the future.

“We want to contribute significantly in the development of sharia banking, both in terms of services and education to the community,” he said.

Buya Anwar highlighted the importance of creating a healthy climate of competition among sharia banks. According to him, the dominance of one bank can lead to monopolistic practices that can harm customers.

“We want all sharia banks to contribute to the maximum so that customers have more choice and competitive prices,” he added.

At the end of May, PP Muhammadiyah instructed Muhammadiyah business charities (AUM) to transfer their funds from Bank Sharia Indonesia (BSI). The funds were then transferred to a number of other sharia banks that have been cooperating with the Islamic State. Among them are Bank Sharia Bukopin, Bank Mega Sharia, and Bank Muamalat.

The withdrawal decision was referred to in Memo Muhammadiyah numbered 320/1.0/A/2024 on the Consolidation of Funds dated May 30, 2024.

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