T

o imagine Indonesia without the Association of Islamic Students (HMI) is next to impossible, given the numerous national figures the country'€™s largest student group has helped groom, many of them still holding strategic public posts.

The series of reprehensible incidents that have occurred in the course of the ongoing HMI congress in Pekanbaru is therefore difficult to understand, let alone believe. For the HMI, one of the nation'€™s best-organized groups, holding a national congress that gathers together hundreds, indeed thousands, of participants should have been a routine job.

Several HMI members committed acts of vandalism and blocked a road in protest at what they regarded as poor treatment by the host on Saturday night; they became embroiled in a fight with supporters of a local soccer club early on Monday and then left Rp 14 million (US$1,000) in unpaid restaurant bills later on Monday. Worse, the police arrested eight HMI members for possession of offensive weapons including homemade firearms during a search conducted following the brawl, which left two people injured.

The congress itself has sparked a controversy as its organizing committee received Rp 3 billion in financial assistance from the Riau regional budget, higher than the amount spent on fighting the forest fires that plagued the province recently.

Such shameful incidents make a mockery of Vice President Jusuf Kalla'€™s praise for HMI, which he described when opening the congress as '€œa future asset of the nation'€. In the eyes of Kalla, a former member, the group has brought forth people who have left a mark on national politics.

Kalla is the second HMI alumnus to have risen to the office of vice president after Hamzah Haz. Other prominent HMI figures include former House of Representatives speaker Akbar Tandjung and former People'€™s Consultative Assembly leader Amien Rais.

Many may follow Kalla'€™s lead by leaping to the defense of the HMI. For them the bad news about HMI members is only good news for the media and does not represent the entire organization.

While it is nonsense to predict the demise of the HMI simply because of these sporadic incidents, it is equally dangerous for the HMI to turn a deaf ear to criticism. Its reputation as a training ground for future national leaders has met real challenges from other Islamic and secular student organizations since the fall of the New Order.

One of several reasons why post-reform students have opted for alternative groups to develop their organizational skills is perhaps the lack of militancy that once enlivened the HMI'€™s chosen struggles. This is natural because there are so many '€œbig brothers'€ or successful alumni ready to lend a hand to HMI activists.

It is not difficult for the HMI to stay relevant today, however. Outstanding former HMI members like the late Nurcholish Madjid and other progressive thinkers have left a precious legacy of preserving democracy in Indonesia. Amid the rise of political Islam, a pluralist Indonesia without the HMI is beyond imagination.