Imagine a world trading solely in gold and silver coins. Imagine the size of your wallet.
Yet this is the ideal world envisaged by some of Malaysia’s activists championing the Islamic gold dinar and silver dirham as a new form of legal tender to replace paper money – a utopia that could see the light of day as early as the middle of next month.
This is when one such group, Muamalah Council, plans to implement the dinar system in Malaysia’s northern state of Kelantan. If information on its website is to be believed, the council has the blessing of the state’s Islamist government, Parti Islam SeMalaysia (Pas), to kickstart the dinar in three moves.
First, the state will pay a quarter of its public servants’ salaries using the dinar. Second, all state companies will accept dinar payments. Lastly, some 600 commercial enterprises will also embrace this currency.