'I have never known anything called tribalism. A very senior cleric in the church accused me of removing Christians from decision-making positions in CBN. I became CBN Governor in 2009; the term of the CBN Board of Directors expired. I recommended a board to President Yar'Dua; out of 11 members on the board only 3 are muslims. The Monetary Policy Committee of the CBN which I constituted has 7 members, only 1 is a muslim. A Deputy Governor's seat became open when I was Governor; Dr Kingsley Moghalu was in Geneva. I went, convinced him to come back to Nigeria and convinced the President to appoint him.
On our 5-member Committee of Governors(COG), 3 are Christians, 2 are muslims. We have 24 departmental directors in CBN that I appointed, only 8 are muslims. Theses are the people who took the decision on Islamic Banking. The Director of Financial Policy and Regulation who signed and issued the guidelines on Islamic Banking, his name is CHRISTIAN Chukwu. He reports to D-G in charge of Financial Systems Stability, Dr K. Moghalu. The report comes to the COG of 5, three(3) of them are Christians. It goes to a board (CBN) of 11, eight ( of them are Christians.
Then all these Christians must be bad christians if they are part of an attempt to Islamise Nigeria. I dont want to engage people. I can discuss this on religious ground. I can quote from Exodus, Deuteronomy and Leviticus. I have quotes on Islamic Banking. I can debate on religious grounds and prove to anybody based on the Bible. In fact, the Natural Council of Christianity at one time said anybody who gives usury should not be buried in a catholic cemetery. I can debate with anybody on religious grounds based on the Bible and the teachings of the Church that usury is less consistent with Christian teachings


Source: THISDAY, Saturday, August 13, 2011 (Page 15)

Usury ( /ˈjuːʒəri/[1] is the practice of charging excessive, unreasonably high, and often illegal interest rates on loans.[2][3]

Originally, when the charging of interest was still banned by Christian churches, usury simply meant the charging of interest at any rate (as well as charging a fee for the use of money, such as at a bureau de change). In countries where the charging of interest became acceptable, the term came to be used for interest above the rate allowed by law. The term is largely derived from Christian religious principles; Riba is the corresponding Arabic term and ribbit is the Hebrew word

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usury

Please click on the wikipedia link and learn more
Most people arguing for and against Islamic Banking (I prefer to call it interest free banking) are arguing from positions of ignorance. Simply research upon the topic and you will be amazed at the insight you will receive

Ps: I am NOT a muslim but I am all in support of an interest free banking platform in Nigeria. It is aimed at developing small to medium scale enterprises and big business will (should) not benefit from it.
And guess what? ? ? It will profit the part of the country that has ALWAYS benefitted from commercial buoyancy more than the other parts of Nigeria.

Research, research and more research!

Shagati