Get a Handle on Income and Expenses
Abdullaah used the information from tracking his day-to-day expenses to develop a monthly budget. When Abdullaah reviewed his budget, he realized he was spending more than he earned. Abdullaah knew if he were going to save N75,000 a month, he had to cut his expenses, earn more money, or both.
He worked overtime at his company, which increased his take-home pay. He bought fewer clothes, discontinued subscription to cable TV channels, reduced his spending on eating out and entertainment.
Tracking his expenses paid off. Abdullaah successfully developed a budget that enables his to save N25,000 each month. Here is his budget. If Abdullaah sticks to it, he will have N25,000 a month that he can:
Put in a bank account. Invest in a retirement plan at work. Invest in halaal stocks/fund. Use to pay off debt.
These are just some of the wealth-building choices available when you budget to save.
Using Abdullaah’s budget as an example, track your income and expenses. Identify changes you can make to increase your income or decrease your expenses, and develop a new budget that includes more savings. Be sure to make reasonable budget changes that you can live with month to month.
To help you maintain the discipline to save:
Save every month.
Have savings automatically deducted from your salary or salary account.
Base your budget on what’s left.
In other words, get on automatic pilot and stay there.
How much do you currently save each month?
N……………………………………………..
How much are you going to save each month?
N……………………………………………
You have now successfully budgeted to save. The next step is saving and investing.
Save and Invest
You have budgeted and identified an amount to save monthly. Where are you going to put your savings? By investing, you put the money you save to work making more money and increasing your wealth. An investment is anything you acquire for future income or benefit. Investments increase by generating income (profits or dividends) or by growing (appreciating) in value. Income earned from your investments and any appreciation in the value of your investments increase your wealth.
Get Guidance
There is an art to choosing ways to invest your savings. Good investments will make money; bad investments will cost money. Do your homework. Gather as much information as you can seek advice from financial experts who are well versed in Islamic rules of financial transaction. Read newspapers, magazines and other publications. Identify credible information sources on the internet. Remember, do not compromise your faith for financial gain. The little that is halaal is better than much of haraam.
When you are saving and investing, the amount of expected return is based on the amount of risk you take with your money. Generally, the higher the expected return, for less risk, an investor will expect a smaller return.
HOW MUCH RISK DO YOU WANT TO TAKE?
Here are some things to think about when determining the amount of risk that best suits you.
Financial Goals
How much money do you want to accumulate over a certain period of time? Your investment decisions should reflect your wealth-creation goals.
Time Horizon
How long can you leave your money invested? If you will need your money in one year, you may want to take less risk than you would if you won’t need your money for 20 years.
Financial Risk Tolerance
Are you in a financial position to invest in riskier alternatives? You should take less risk if you cannot afford to lose your investment or have its value fall.
Inflation Risk
This reflects savings’ and investments’ sensitivity to the inflation rate. For example, while some investments have no risk of default, there is the risk that inflation will rise above the return on investment earn 5 percent profit, inflation must remain lower than 5 percent a year for you to realize a profit
A Tale of Two Siege
It will readily count as one of the bloodiest weeks in contemporary times. Just as the world was being assaulted by grim images from Mumbai in India, came news of politically inspired bloodshed in Jos, Nigeria. In all, about 600 lives were lost, where hundreds of innocents were wounded and displaced both in both cities. Sadly, we have the task, once again, of seeking answers to some of the most perplexing but recurrent puzzles of contemporary times.
Why is it so easy to abuse religious ideology for political ends? Why is it so easy to find beguiled individuals who are so totally lacking in a sense of humanity or proportion to perpetrate maximum damage on fellow citizens going about their normal lives? And then, when will our world gather sufficient courage to unmask the true motivations of these impostors (sponsors and foot soldiers alike) and disable them?
Mumbia and Jos may be thousands of kilometers apart, the dramatis personae of both tragedies may be different; indeed, the methods of execution differ in their levels of sophistication, but as we shall shortly show, both events have common origins, and that being so, a common solution can be proferred for both.
The Jos crises were inspired primarily by local politics. By all accounts, the murderers were triggered by widespread anger over the alleged rigging of the local government elections in favor of the ruling PDP. Added to this was the existing chasm between the Tarok “indigenes” and the Hausa “settlers” over the alleged domination of one by the other.
The same mix of sentiments had ignited riots in 2001 and 2004. But in what is apparently the strongest demonstration of the fact that nobody learnt any lessons from those earlier crises, “religious extremists” have been fingered as the convenient culprits. Just like in earlier riots, cynical calls for “tolerance” and “peaceful co-existence” pollute the air. These calls may be good sound bites, but they reveal a callous play on the intelligence of Nigerians, particularly when they come from politicians.
One would expect a wide-ranging purge of the sponsors and instigators of this mindless violence, or at the very least that they would shut up and let state innocent victims mend in peace. But, what do we get? Politicians have seized the opportunity to call for the carving out of four local councils in Jos, to demand a state of emergency so that the present governor can be replaced by their own man, etc.
All of these expose the real motivations for the crises. We must therefore continue to expose the lie that the Jos and similar crises in the north were motivated by religious differences (especially since, by "religion", our traducers really mean Islaam). Even if that were so, of what use are security apparatus who could not stem the crises? In this case, the so-called chief security officer has apparently spent more time denying internet reports that Muslims were killed in a mosque, blaming mercenaries imported from neighbouring states, and generally looking for convenient scapegoats.
It was even reported that the state government had scheduled the inauguration of local government chairman for whom the blood of almost two hundred people were shed, until the Head of State personally intervened to stop this "highly insensitive" action. Insensitivity or madness? By contrast, several Indian cials officials have honourably resigned their offices in acknowledgement of their lapses - even though no-one has accused them of sponsoring the violence, as with their Nigerian counterparts. That is notable.
The Jos crises are the result of an insensitive exploitation of primordial ethnic sentiments by an opportunistic political class. Tracing the roots of the Mumbai tragedy is however more complex. India has accused Pakistan, its fellow nuclear-armed neighbour of being (directly or indirectly) behind the three-day siege on Mumbai. Fingers are pointing at Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Jihadist/guerrilla group that Pakistan allegedly trained to fight against Indian occupation of Kashmir.
Pakistan denies the claim, pointing out that Lahskar was banned in 2002 after it was implicated in the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament. Both countries might find themselves at the brink of a fourth war if the allegations do not let up.
One may argue that the Indian accusations are still speculative, but we should learn some incisive lessons here, which we can profitably apply elsewhere – from London to Baghdad. When the Americans trained the Mujahideen in Afghanistan to fight a proxy war against the Russians, they claimed to be supporting freedom fighters. The same "freedom-fighters" have now morphed into groups like al-Qaidah, spreading their ideology across continents and wreaking havoc in their wake. Guns, bombs, missiles and other weapons of war cannot of themselves discriminate against victims: children women, and the infirm. The rioters in Jos, the gunmen of Mumbai, the suicide bombers in Iraq and Afghanistan are just mere weapons in the hands of cowardly puppeteers who exploit their fervour and ignorance to achieve political ends.
The cold blooded slaughter of innocents in Mumbai and Jos are inspired by political jobbers, and we should have the courage to confront this fact. We should have the spunk to declare that these individuals and their minions are not fighting our cause; that they do not represent us, and that we do not share their ideology. just as our religion demands fairness and justice, we must also demand that these people be called to account, and that those in authority be honest enough to declare the facts. Only then can we begin to hope that these mindless killings will stop.
This article was culled from the publications of Deen Communication Limited