JAKARTA, Aug. 13 (Xinhua) -- Indonesian Islamic banking required real steps
of the government to make it par with those in other countries, head of the
Islamic banking association Riawan Amin said here Thursday.
Riawan said that Indonesian Islamic banking needs a quick real supports
from the government through its policies in settling various problems that
linger the banking system in developing itself.
Comparing with what have already been applied by the government in the
neighboring country Malaysia, Riawan said that as of now, the Indonesian
government is yet to make actual moves to settle the problems.
"The Malaysian government has provided tax incentives, but our government
is yet to take any policy on the double tax issue that persists in national
Islamic banking system," he said.
According to the director of the largest Islamic bank in the country, the
double tax has been the most problem complained by Islamic bank customers and
investors who want to put their investments in Indonesian Islamic bank's
portfolios.
Due to the minimum assistance from the government, the Islamic banks in
Indonesia failed to comply with the target that their assets accounted for 5
percent from total asset of banks operating in the country by 2008.
According to the data issued by the Indonesian central bank, the asset of
national Islamic banks stood at 47.18 trillion rupiah(about 47 billion U.S.
dollars) by the end of last year, or lower than the asset of conventional banks
that reached 1,632,587 trillion rupiah (some 164.2 billion dollars) in the same
period.