Nomination Status In Islamic And Civil Law

Abstract

This article discusses the concept of nomination and status of nominee for Muslims estate from the Islamic and Civil Law perspectives in Malaysia. The discussion focuses on nominated estates (Employee Provident Fund, Pilgrimage Fund, Insurance Compensation and Takaful Benefit), opinions from Islamic Scholars, fatwas regarding to nomination in Malaysia and its differences among other estate planning instruments. This study also compares the differences between the Islamic and Civil law perspectives regarding to nominated property. In Malaysia, the main problem on nomination is the nominee does not distribute the nominated property to the legal heirs due to the assumption that the property belong to nominee absolutely. According to the Islamic law, the nominated property is categorized as inheritance estate which is subjected to faraid regulations and the nominee acts as a wasi (trustee) who is accountable to allocate that estate to the legal heirs. From Civil Law perspectives, nomination will facilitate the distribution of estate without Grant of Probate, Letter of Administration or Distribution Order which takes a lengthy time progress. This study recommends that the nomination should be one of the Islamic estate planning instruments since its function can accelerate the distribution of deceased estate to legal heirs and avoid the failure of estate distribution.