Comment: NII ban not needed: Assembly leader

May 5, Online

As East Java moves to issue a regulation banning the Indonesia Islamic State (NII) movement, the speaker of the People’s Consultative Assembly said Tuesday such regulation was not necessary.

Assembly Speaker Taufik Kiemas said there was no need to mete out the treatment, similar to that faced by the Indonesian Communist Party, because the Islamic movement had never attempted a coup, unless proven otherwise.

An attempt to thwart the growth of the NII, which aspires to turn Indonesia into an Islamic state, is currently underway in East Java, with the provincial administration planning the issuance of a gubernatorial regulation.

Your comments:

The article says that “a former “minister” for NII, Imam Supriyanto, told the House of Representatives that the NII had infiltrated political parties posing as members.”
Does this mean what it says?

Or does it mean that NII has infiltrated political parties by becoming members?

John Hargreaves
Jakarta

As long as there are many low-income people in Indonesia, NII will have no problem recruiting members or followers. Just like the Communist Party, poor people were target number one to increase its members.

NII will disappear as soon as the Indonesian people eradicate poverty and give more people an education.

Widya Utama
Bergen, Norway