Gulf African banking hall. The bank, which operates on Shariah law, said the Annissa Centre would accord women privacy as they conduct business. Photo/FILE
Gulf African Bank has launched a women-only branch in Eastleigh, Nairobi, in line with religious principles that discourage uncontrolled interaction between the sexes.
The bank, which operates on Shariah law, said the Annissa Centre would accord women privacy as they conduct business.
“The branch will uphold the dignity of women because Islam discourages overinteraction between men and women,” said Annissa branch service manager Najma Jabri. The branch to be exclusively run by women is, however, open to all women irrespective of religion.
Gulf African Bank company secretary Amina Bashir said many Muslim women could not access credit because of interest charged by conventional banks.
“Many Muslim women can’t access credit, because interest is prohibitive and conventional banks rarely offer such services for them,” said Ms Bashir.
Islam forbids the charging of interest on credit and money is advanced on a joint ownership arrangement known as asset banking. “We share the profit with you because trading is allowed,” says Ms Bashir.
Gulf African Bank launched Annissa account in 2008.
The account can be used as a current or savings account.
“If you have Annissa account with over Sh10,000, we will pay profit on it,” said Jabri.
Gulf African Bank was incorporated in August, 2006 and started operations as a commercial bank in 2008 becoming Kenya’s first fully-fledged Islamic bank. The bank has 14 branches, eight in Nairobi and six in other parts of the country.
Its loanbook grew from Sh6.3 billion as at March 2011 to Sh8.07 billion representing an increase of 11 per cent.
In the first quarter of this year, the bank made a profit of Sh65.1 million while the profit for the year 2011 up to December was Sh95. 1 million. [email protected]
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