Published analysis
Read the full article on Maldives News: Profit Belongs to the One Who Bears the Risk
Standfirst. Maldives News launches its Enterprise page today. We begin with an old maxim of the fiqh, the working life of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), the woman who financed it, and a market in Medina with no tax and no gatekeeper.
Key facts
- Launch essay for the Maldives News Enterprise page, published 30 August 2026, arguing entrepreneurship is native to Islamic and Maldivian tradition rather than a foreign import.
- Built on the fiqh maxim al-ghunm bil-ghurm (gain belongs with liability): profit is legitimate for the one who bears the risk, which is the entrepreneur, not the salaried post.
- Anchors the case in the seerah: the Prophet’s decades in the caravan trade before revelation, Khadija bint Khuwaylid as investor under qirad/mudaraba, the tax-free ungated Medina market (Ibn Majah 2233, Ibn Shabbah), and the refusal to fix prices in scarcity (Abu Dawud 3451).
- Reads the Medina market as supply-side policy: lowering the cost of producing and selling draws traders in, against a Maldivian policy instinct that answers every fiscal gap from the demand side (TGST up, green tax doubled, levies broadened).
- Cites the finance minister’s figure to parliament this month: 53 per cent of Maldivian employment is public sector, in a country whose foreign earnings come almost entirely from one private industry.
- Sets the page’s agenda: profiling Maldivian founders, explaining mudaraba, musharaka and waqf in plain terms, and scrutinising every rule, fee and gate between a Maldivian and a business licence.