Bekasi Mayor, MUI Petition SBY to Ban Ahmadiyah
This picture taken on April 9, 2013 shows zinc sheets covering fences and a sign reading 'Bekasi government halts activities by Ahmadiyah congregations in Bekasi' outside Al Misbah mosque in Bekasi. (AFP Photo/Adek Berry)
Bekasi Mayor Rahmat Effendi and local Islamic leaders will petition President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to institute a nationwide ban on the oppressed Ahmadiyah Muslim sect.
"The request is part of an agreement between Bekasi ulema and the [local] government who met to discuss the Ahmadiyah today," Rahmat told the state-run Antara News Agency on Monday.
The mayor met with the Bekasi chapter of the Indonesian Council of Ulema (MUI) to hash out a solution to the city's strained relationship with its Ahmadiyah community on Monday. The solution, according to Rahmat, is a complete ban on the religious sect.
The Bekasi MUI threw its support behind the city's ban on the Ahmadiyah, demanding that followers renounce their beliefs and convert to mainstream Islam. Local MUI head Mursyid Kamil urged the central government to either shut down all Ahmadiyah places of worship or strip them of Islamic symbols. All Ahmadiyah members should convert to mainstream Islam, Mursyid said. The Bekasi MUI plans to convert the sect's Al Misbah mosque, in Pondok Gede, to mainstream Islam as a way to promote interfaith harmony, he said.
The Bekasi Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) shuttered the Al Misbah mosque on April 5, locking at least 20 followers inside the mosque. The congregation said they planned to remain in the mosque in protest of the local government's actions. But the Ahmadiyah, sealed behind a metal wall erected around the mosque, have struggled with occasional police interference as officers attempted to prevent community members from delivering the protestors food.
What kind of true Islam? If he means… the FPI, it's better for us not to be MuslimFirdaus, Jemaah Ahmadiyah Indonesia
Rahmat said he didn't want to hear accusations that the police or local government had violated the community's rights.
"We banned Ahmadiyah activities, but it was violated," he said. "The 20 members who decided to stay inside the mosque, it's of their own will, so don't blame the Bekasi government by saying that it's a human rights violation."
Jemaah Ahmadiyah Indonesia accused Rahmat of only presenting one side of the meeting. Monday's discussion was attended by several ulemas from the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) and Indonesian Islamic Preaching Council (DDII), who pushed for harsh sanctions against the Ahmadiyah, JAI spokesman Firdaus said.
But representatives from both Nahdlatul Ulama and the Muhammadiyah — the two largest Islamic organizations in Indonesia — were present at the meeting and offered more moderate solutions.
Firdaus refused to meet the Bekasi mayor and MUI's demands.
"If the mayor wants us to return the true Islamic teaching, please ask him what kind of true Islam that he was referring to," Firdaus said. "If he means true Islam like the FPI, it's better for us not to be Muslim."
He urged the mayor to sit with the Ahmadiyah community, instead of hard-line groups, to work out a solution to the issue.
"He wants to ask the president?" Firdaus said. "This is a Democratic nation. He should sit together and have a discussion with us, to let people know the real problem. [This is] something he has never done."
Religious intolerance is a serious issue in West Java, where hard-line Islamists stage regular assaults on the institutions of religious minorities. The groups operate without fear of mass arrests and, seemingly, with tacit support from the local government, critics alleged. The Wahid Institute recorded 102 cases of intolerance and violations against religious minorities in 2012. Forty occurred in West Java.
The province's Islamist governor Ahmad Heryawan, who won the recent election by a narrow margin, previously told the Indonesian newspaper Kompas that the Ahmadiyah's "deviant belief" will stop causing problems when "the belief disappears." He told the Jakarta Globe in an interview that claims of religious intolerance in West Java were exaggerated.
"In my opinion this is the most tolerant province. There is no problem, except in the corners of West Java. The corner of a small area is where the problems occur, and the situation cannot be characterized as intolerant," Ahmad said.
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