TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Politicians, clerics contesting NU top post
The upcoming national conference of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the country’s largest mass Muslim organization, is likely to see a tight race between intellectuals and politicians with seven figures set to contend in the election of a new NU chairman to replace outgoing leader Hasyim Muzadi
Change Size
T
he upcoming national conference of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the country’s largest mass Muslim organization, is likely to see a tight race between intellectuals and politicians with seven figures set to contend in the election of a new NU chairman to replace outgoing leader Hasyim Muzadi.
In the past few months, the candidates have been busy making field trips to regions, mainly NU’s strongholds in East Java, to campaign for their visions and programs in their bid to solicit support from the organization’s functionaries. Several candidates or their campaign teams have created Facebook accounts for the same purpose.
The candidates generally share the vision that they want to regain the religious organization’s fame when it was under the leadership of the late former president Abdurrahman “Gus Dur” Wahid.
They equally pledged to make the NU a strong mass Muslim organization to help the state counter extremism, radicalism and terrorism, while committing to staying out of politics. They also vowed to turn the religious organization into a “comfortable great house” for all of its followersMasdar Farid Mas’ud, currently a deputy NU chairman, says he wants to expand the organization’s strongholds up to mosques, the lowest level of Muslim community, and empower its traditional base of Islamic boarding schools (pesantren).
The move aims to prevent NU-founded mosques from being occupied by extremist Muslim groups, Masdar added.
“NU must take concrete action to empower all functionaries and members and campaign for moderation to promote religious tolerance and help make Indonesia a big, safe house for all different religious groups. Not only NU members but also non-Muslim communities will benefit from the organization’s presence and activities.”
Masdar claims that months before his death, Gus Dur wanted him to lead the NU in the future. The statement was confirmed by Gus Dur’s daughter Zannuba “Yenny” Wahid and several other clerics.
If elected, Masdar said, he would form a strong NU executive board, comprising 60 percent academics, professionals and businesspeople, and 40 percent clerics.
Said Agil Siradj, born in Cirebon in 1953, expressed his desire to return NU to a pesantren as Gus Dur did in the past.
“Nahdlatul Ulama has to regain its reputation in pesantren, which have been neglected in the past decade.”
Pesantren and its education programs have to be reformed and empowered to create “men of religion” and “men of morals, and this will eliminate the public accusation that pesantren are hubs of hardliners”, Said said
Said, also a deputy chairman of NU and close to the military, obtained his PhD from the Ummu al-Qura University in Saudi Arabia in 1994.
“I have sent dozens of NU cadres to study abroad and in the future, the organization has to send more students to study abroad. This way, Islam, and NU especially, will appear not only as aqidah [faith] and sharia but will show its existence as a community offering knowledge, civilization, ethics and peace culture or a better civil society. Therefore, religion and civilization will form a synergy to help the nation achieve advancements.
Salahuddin “Gus Solah” Wahid, backed by senior clerics in East Java, is known not only because he is the younger brother of Gus Dur but also a technocrat who graduated from the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB). He now leads the Tebuireng Islamic boarding school in his hometown in Jombang, East Java.
“My vision is to make NU a main strength to empower all layers in the organization. NU in the future should be able to play a leading role in the development of social potential. NU has to take a leading role in settling problems of the people, regardless of their background, ethnicities and religions.”
Gus Solah, who lost the 2004 vice presidential election, said NU and its branches at all levels have to work hand in hand with other civil society groups and the government to settle the nation’s problems in the future.
He was born in Jombang in 1942 and has held strategic positions in many institutions, including the National Commission of Human Rights, and a construction company.
Ahmad Bagja has his main program to synergize all NU potentials to allow it to take a leading role in the country’s social life because the organization will not achieve significant progress if it only relies on clerics.
“Clerics in the future have to make a synergy with professionals, intellectuals, politicians and the bureaucracy,” he said, adding a clear-cut separation between the syuriah (policy-making) board and the tanfidziyah (executive) board should be made.
Bagja, who is close to outgoing chairman Hasyim Muzadi, claims to have won support for his chairmanship bid from NU branches in Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi and Sumatra.
Born in Kuningan, West Java, in 1943, Bagja has been an activist since his graduation from the Jakarta Teaching Institute in 1971 and is a deputy NU chairman Ulil Abshar-Abdalla has been known not only as a son-in-law of Mustafa Bisri, an NU influential cleric from Rembang in Central Java, but also a young Muslim intellectual who founded the Liberal Islam Network (JIL).
He graduated with a Bachelor degree in sharia faculty in LIPIA (the Islamic and Arabic Knowledge Institute), and was educated in the Driyarkara School of Philosophy. He once led NU’s Lakpesdam (the Human Resources Research and Development Center), and is program director in the Indonesian Conference on Religion and Peace.
After completing his master’s degree in religion in Boston University, he went on and continued his PhD studies in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Havard University.
However, Ulil’s bid for the NU leadership race will likely be rejected by senior clerics for his liberal interpretations of Islam.
Slamet Effendy Yusuf, a former senior Golkar Party politician, says the NU should no longer be involved in practical politics.
“To achieve advancements in the future, NU should design concrete programs to settle all problems facing its members nationwide. So far, NU has been trapped in making statements and discourses that cannot fully settle the problems. Therefore, NU should promote professionalism and intensify the education and training programs to produce qualified human resources and competent people in executing the concrete programs.”
If elected to lead NU, Slamet said he would send more NU members to study at universities to improve the organization’s human resources.
Ali Maschan Musa, born in Tulungagung, East Java, in 1956, said he wants to return NU to its strong spiritualism and that all available human resources would be consolidated to contribute to the organization and its members nationwide.
He said his long experience in the organization and political parties was a social capital to bring the NU back to its original spiritualism of empowering the people and promoting a civil society.
Ali Maschan, who obtained his PhD in political science from Airlangga University in Surabaya, is chairman of the NU’s East Java provincial chapter and a former chairman of its affiliated youth wing Ansor. He lost the East Java gubernatorial election in 2008.
“Leading NU must be free from personal interests and must be ready to work for 24 hours a day for the sake of the people. My guru is NU co-founder Hasyim Asy’ari,” Ali said.
