Sensitive religious issue should be kept private, legislator says

The Jakarta Post   |  Mon, 06/29/2009 1:52 PM

Presidential candidate campaign teams must not publicly attack one another regarding religion, a lawmaker says.

"If any team decides to go into the public domain with religious issues, we will face broad emotional impacts," Ferry Mursyidan Baldan, a legislator from the Golkar Party faction at the House of Representatives said in Jakarta on Monday.

"Therefore, any dispute concerning religious issues should be addressed in private, under the mediation of the General Elections Commission [KPU]," he added.

The Democratic Party (PD) demanded the General Elections Supervisory Body (Bawaslu) take firm action against the Golkar Party for its ignorance of a smear campaign pamphlet distributed during a recent campaign.

The pamphlet said the wife of the Democratic Party’s vice presidential candidate Boediono is a Catholic, although in fact she is a Muslim.

"There is no way that Golkar did not know about the pamphlets, as they were widely distributed during Golkar's campaign," Syariff Hassan from the Democratic Party faction said recently.

However, reports said the pamphlet distributor, Adi Zein Ginting, admitted he was instructed by Wahab Dalimunthe, a Democratic Party campaign team regional leader.

Wahab insisted he was innocent and just a victim of a dirty political maneuver by the Golkar Party. (hdt)
 

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