• With the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak and Ben Ali people are now hoping for a just, accountable government that will put the ordinary people’s interests ahead of the regime’s.

• Can Western style democracy deliver this? We have seen multiparty democracy in Bangladesh, Iraq, in Pakistan after the removal of Musharraf and even in Afghanistan. Has this brought any change to the politics of our countries?

• The politicians who win such elections are usually those who have money, influence and are close to America and the West, and this simply becomes a tool to legitimise a corrupt set of ‘democrats’. They are hardly free and fair.

• Simply holding elections is not enough. The debate needs to be about the type of system of governance that should exist in the Muslim world.

• In the capitalist ‘democratic’ system, money determines who wins elections. After people vote these politicians into office, the people have no influence on the policies that are implemented upon them. MP’s who are under the ‘whip’ of the government then vote all sorts of policies through parliament.

• Our resources and public services are sold off to foreign companies with politicians taking a cut, so political capital turns into private capital. Our lands are used as military bases to attack Muslims. Treaties are made with countries that are our enemies. This is democracy and the only ‘freedom’ people have is to chose amongst these corrupt politicians.

• Unlike the capitalist system, the Islamic Khilafah system will not allow the Khalifah to just pass through any policy he likes because the Islamic Shariah binds him. The people have the explicit right to remove the Khalifah from office if he implements anything that contradicts the Quran and Sunnah, or is found to be corrupt. No amount of money or lobby-ing will allow the Khalifah to implement any law that contradicts the Shariah. In this way the people will always know what they will be ruled by.

• The Islamic system obliges the people to account the ruler whether as individuals or parties or via the media independent of the state. Furthermore, there are institutions enshrined in the Islamic constitution to keep a check on the rulers in the Khilafah. A special independent court (Qadi Mathalim) will be established whose function is to investi-gate any oppression carried out by the rulers. Also, a Masjlis as-Shura will have the function of accounting and scruti-nising the rulers.

• The Muslim Ummah today does not need to borrow systems from the West. Systems which have even lost credibility even amongst Western populations. It is time this Ummah turned to her aqeeda, tradition and heritage – rejecting the western solutions forced on her for decades – and establish the Islamic Khilafah System heralding a new era in politics in our countries.

• The Prophet (sallallahu alaihi wa sallam) said: You must enjoin the good, and you must forbid the evil, or Allah will make sovereign over you the worst of you, who will afflict you with the worst of punishment. Then the best you you will make Du’a and it will not be answered. [Ibn Qayyim]

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