Financial Inclusion as a Step Towards Justice and Combating Marginalisation (1–2)

Ali Ahmed Daggash
In two thoughtful and well-structured articles published in Al-Muhaqqiq, Ms Hiba Mahmoud Sadiq Farid picked up the mantle and led the discourse surrounding the Central Bank of Sudan’s recent decision to convert the Microfinance Unit into a General Directorate for Financial Inclusion. It is a decision that those concerned with social economics and social justice should not let pass without serious reflection.
Hiba seized the opportunity, pouring out extensive knowledge and laying out a wealth of accumulated experience grounded in practical application.
Hiba Mahmoud is a specialist in public policy. She pursued advanced postgraduate studies in public policy at the International Institute of Public Policy and Management (INPUMA) at the University of Malaya, Malaysia. She followed this with hands-on training in Sudan for civil service leaders, conducted in collaboration with Malaysian experts from the University of Malaya.
Hiba founded and managed the Productive Employment for Graduates project, which aimed to combat graduate unemployment by expanding opportunities for self-employment and establishing a dedicated financing portfolio for graduates—pioneered by the Savings and Social Development Bank. The project later evolved into the Graduate Employment Fund.
She subsequently moved to the Central Bank of Sudan as Director of the Microfinance Unit, benefiting from her extensive experience in shaping and managing small-enterprise projects through the graduate employment programme and her membership in regional microfinance networks. She left a clear imprint on the Unit, reflected in the development of financial products, training in project management, and the promotion of a culture of self-employment.
Therefore, when Hiba comments on the Central Bank’s recent policies—particularly the decision to transform the Microfinance Unit into a General Directorate for Financial Inclusion—her commentary is unquestionably that of an expert and practitioner whose insights deserve the Bank’s attention.
The establishment of a General Directorate for Financial Inclusion within the Central Bank is an important shift and a practical step along a long road leading to wider participation and the fight against marginalisation. It should be accompanied by strong momentum and engagement from all those interested in social economics.
I suggest that the Central Bank organise a dedicated workshop to present key issues related to developing financial inclusion and proposing macro-level policies that would support its success.
It is worth noting that, coinciding with Hiba’s articles, journalist Nahid Oshi published an interview in Asda’ Sudan (Monday, 24 November 2025) with banking expert and specialist in microfinance and financial inclusion, Mr Naaman Yousif Mohamed. The timing of this interview demonstrates a growing awareness of community-based economics—an awareness the Central Bank should leverage in promoting financial inclusion.
Financial inclusion is closely linked to social economics, social justice, and the fight against marginalisation and exclusion—issues emphasised by all divine religions and by modern political systems concerned with sustainable development and social equity.
The greatest revolutions of past centuries—such as the French Revolution, which abolished feudalism and aristocratic privilege—considered social justice among their most central demands. More than a century later, the Communist Revolution toppled the Tsarist state to establish the rule of the proletariat (though it later failed).
The concept of the social contract, theorised by great philosophers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau, follows the same path.
In Islam, there is a key principle for achieving social justice: breaking the monopoly of wealth, broadening its circulation, and increasing the number of beneficiaries—thereby expanding total production and achieving abundance. This stems from the Qur’anic injunction:
{“…so that wealth does not circulate solely among the rich among you.”} (Al-Hashr: 7)
The Islamic economic system establishes several foundational principles:
Wealth belongs to God:
{“Give them out of the wealth that God has bestowed upon you.”} (An-Nur: 33)
Human beings are trustees of wealth:
{“Spend from that over which He has made you trustees.”} (Al-Hadid: 7)
Spending and circulation of wealth is a duty; hoarding is forbidden:
{“Those who hoard gold and silver and do not spend it in the way of God—give them tidings of a painful punishment.”} (At-Tawbah: 34)
{“You will never attain righteousness until you spend of that which you love.”} (Āl-‘Imrān: 92)
Exclusive concentration of wealth in the hands of a single class is prohibited:
{“…so that wealth does not circulate solely among the rich among you.”}
Regulated mechanisms for wealth circulation are legitimate:
{“Do not entrust your wealth to the foolish, for God has made it a means of support for you.”} (An-Nisa’: 5)
Islam devised several mechanisms to break down wealth concentration and extend it to the poor and needy—such as encouraging spending, zakat, endowments, charity, and inheritance. Even inheritance—despite its fixed shares—allows for giving to relatives, orphans, and the poor who are present at the division:
{“…then provide for them from it and speak kindly to them.”} (An-Nisa’: 8)
In our commentary on Hiba Mahmoud’s first article, we noted that banks are, in principle, the large vaults entrusted with safeguarding money and regulating its movement among people. But banks have deviated from this mission under the pretext of protecting capital. They shifted from guardians of financial flow to jailers of financial activity—by introducing “strict collateral requirements” such as pledging assets and valuables, which are usually unavailable to the poor.
Banks must strike a balance between the need to preserve capital and the Qur’anic principle:
“Do not entrust your wealth to the foolish.”
(To be continued in Part 2)

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