THE IMPORTANCE OF ZAKAT INTERVIEW PANEL: AN ANALYSIS AT UNIT ZAKAT, SEDEKAH AND WAKAF (UZSW) UiTM JOHOR BRANCH

Zakat institutions play an important role to distribute zakat to the qualified asnaf according to the specific conditions and requirements. Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Johor Branch is one of the universities that apply zakat interview panel under Unit Zakat, Sedekah and Wakaf (UZSW). However, there is an issue where some of the people still does not receive zakat even though they meet the requirements. Therefore, this research is conducted to study the importance of zakat interview panel in choosing qualified asnaf recipient to receive zakat at Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Johor. This study uses qualitative method by using data through primary sources and semi-structured interview. The primary data is extracted from USZW of UiTM Johor and is analyzed through document analysis. Meanwhile, data from semi-structured interview is analyzed by using thematic approach. The result of the study shows that there is an increase in the number of panels from 2023 to 2024 which is from 34 panels to 38 panels. The recruitment of zakat interview panel is very important to conduct zakat interview session, verify the document of zakat applicants, identify asnaf category among zakat recipients, deliver da’wah and advice to the zakat applicants and speed up the interview and review process. As a conclusion, zakat interview panel is greatly significant and important as the panel really helps zakat management in smoothen the interview process of zakat applicants in UiTM Johor. The existence of the panel is necessary to maximise the effectiveness of zakat management.