Takaful takes insurance profits to the people

In keeping with its promise of caring and sharing with the Gambian people, especially its policyholders, Takaful, the only sharia-compliance insurance company in The Gambia, has continued to share its profits with its clients and the needy.  As Gambia News Online reports, this is the second year the company has been distributing millions of dalasis to its policyholders. 

Takaful Insurance Company on Thursday began the sharing of its 2010 profits and zakat (alms) to its policyholders (participants) and institutions in need of help at a ceremony held at the company’s head office in Banjul.

The company has set out to distribute over D2.5 million, half a million more than it shared for its 2009 financial year.

Takaful's operation or system of insurance is said to be in accordance with the Shariah requirements and that customers are entitled to earn profits under the company's Profit Sharing Agreement, which forms part of the Takaful Insurance Contract.

Takaful MD, Mr Joof

Speaking on the occasion, the managing director and chief executive officer of Takaful Gambia Ltd, Momodou M. Joof, recalled that during their last year profit sharing, “some sceptics said it was one hit wonder, a premature fluke or simply just a way to dupe the public” to insure with Takaful.

“In fact some were daring enough to announcing on air that it’s too good to be true but today we are here distributing more than we distributed last year,” he said.

Mr Joof said his company’s profit sharing is neither charity work nor a gesture they have chosen to provide. “But as the Gambian people’s insurance company, it is an obligation to the Gambian society, an obligation to the participants for generating a profitable funds, an obligation to the Gambian government in allowing them to practise based on their promise to share profits and most importantly an obligation to Islam for the right to practise insurance based on its values of ethics and fairness.”

The concept of Takaful is to promote and advocate fairness in the business of insurance. Other financial institutions practise corporate social responsibility but do not share their profits as does Takaful, Mr Joof said. “Quite honestly, none of the financial institutions are yet to be good as sharing profits generated through their operations,” he added.

Many distinguished personalities and institutions including the managing director of Trust Bank, Pa Macoumba Njie, and the managing directors of Arab Gambian Islamic Bank, Africell and Gamworks Agency received their shares of Takaful’s profits.

Amie Bensouda, chairperson of Takaful board of directors, maintained that Takaful as an insurance concept and sound business proposition has continued to grow in the Gambian public.

This is in recognition of the fact that Takaful insurance provides the “most logical option” for their insurance needs, she said. “It is an option that allows them not only to acquire insurance protection, but to do so within a participatory framework and the potential to benefit substantially if they abide by its terms.”

Talib Bensouda, Takaful’s marketing manager, in his remarks on the occasion, said they have the perfect insurance model based on their participants’ joint interest, joint guarantee and joint benefit, “which is the ‘win win win’ formula”.

“This is the perfect formula because the profits to be shared to participants are based on their own collective behaviour towards the insurance scheme,” Mr Bensouda said, adding: “The participants who pay on time, agree to pay the actual price and, most importantly, those who do not make any claim [during the business and financial year] are rated very highly in the profit-sharing formula.”