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Party fractions support Bogor mayor sealed GKI Yasmin

The Golkar Party and the Democratic Party factions at the Bogor Legislative Council (DPRD) support Mayor Diani Budiarto’s stance to keep GKI Taman Yasmin church sealed despite the fact that it violates a Supreme Court ruling

Hans David Tampubolon (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Thu, December 1, 2011

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Party fractions support Bogor mayor sealed GKI Yasmin

T

he Golkar Party and the Democratic Party factions at the Bogor Legislative Council (DPRD) support Mayor Diani Budiarto’s stance to keep GKI Taman Yasmin church sealed despite the fact that it violates a Supreme Court ruling.

Both Golkar and the Democratic Party’s chairmen at the council voiced their support during an audience with hard-line Islamic mass organization representatives on Wednesday. The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) also pledged its stance to support Diani, kompas.com reported.

Previously, national central board executives from both parties had said that they had ordered their members on the council to take political action against Diani by issuing an interpellation initiative due to his persistence in barring
the church members from conducting their religious services in their own church building regardless of the fact that a Supreme Court ruling last year guaranteed their rights to do so.

With the latest move at the council, the only major party that still clearly stated its opposition against Diani was the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the first party that announced to the public plans to take political action against the mayor.

The PDI-P faction chairman on the council, Slamet Wijaya, told the audience that if they supported the pluralist state ideology Pancasila, the five basic foundations of the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesian (NKRI), then they should respect GKI Yasmin members’ right to conduct services in their own building.

The GKI Yasmin church members have been barred from conducting their religious services inside their own building for more than two years due to an endless legal battle with the Bogor administration led by Diani, who claimed that there were many objections from nearby residents about the congregation.

Diani also once cited that the GKI Yasmin church building, located on Jl. Abdullah bin Nuh, had no right to be established on a street whose name was taken from a famous Islamic leader.

Family members of Abdullah later said they did not endorse Diani’s statement.

Abdullah’s son Muhammad Mustofa said Islam was a tolerant religion that always respected pluralism.

“Mecca is a shining example of pluralism. Every problem has a solution and we hope a resolution can soon be found,” he was quoted as saying by Radar Bogor newspaper in August.

Separately, Setara Institute human rights watchdog says that President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had to take a firm, direct measure with his subordinate, Diani, to settle the GKI Yasmin issue, because it had escalated from a local problem into a national one.

“SBY must show that the law must stand tall. The mayor might have his autonomous authority, but religious issues are the domain of the central government and therefore, the President has the right to intervene in the matter.

“The President cannot leave this matter in the hands of Home Minister Gamawan Fauzi, who is clearly in favor of the mayor,” Setara Institute deputy chairman Bonar Tigor Naipospos told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.

Bonar also said that there was no need for the GKI Yasmin congregation members to renegotiate their building permission because their rights to the land and the building had been guaranteed by the law.

“Any renegotiation would only degrade the law’s supremacy and the authority of the court,” he said.

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