Polygamy Inc: how Global Ikhwan is becoming a lifestyle choice for many devout Muslims
With its controversial views on marriage and links to a banned religious sect, Global Ikhwan is proving divisive in Malaysia. Marta Kasztelan looks at a conglomerate that is less a company and more a lifestyle choice for its 4,000 ‘members’.
Sliding through his smartphone photo gallery, Lokman Hakim proudly shows off his 27 children – 15 from his first wife, eight from the second, one from the third and three from his fourth. The 47-year-old Malay considers himself fortunate because so many women agreed to enter into a polygamous union with him. While such an arrangement is legal in Malaysia, it is largely frowned upon in the moderate Muslim country.
“That’s life. It’s just something you have to go through,” explains Lokman, as he pockets his phone.
A more worrying issue, he says, is the stigma attached to his current occupation: he is the chief executive of Global Ikhwan, a Malaysian company with links to banned Islamic sect Al-Arqam.
Founded in the 1960s by Ashaari Mohammad, who had 40 children with his four wives – the maximum number allowed under Malaysian law – Al-Arqam owned a number of businesses and had strict rules regarding Islamic dress code and behaviour.
“It started with one family, then friends [joined] and it eventually lead to intermarriages,” Lokman explains.
Al-Arqam was banned by the Malaysian religious authorities in 1994, and five members were arrested and detained under the Internal Security Act. The teachings of Ashaari were considered deviant by the authorities because they allegedly alluded to supernatural powers and promoted unorthodox views about communicating with the Prophet.
After the ban, Ashaari set up what Lokman describes as an “Islamic business”, called Rufaqa, which became Syarikat Global Ikhwan and then, in May 2013, just Global Ikhwan.
