H

eated tension over the operation by the indigenous Karo people of restaurants serving pork in the now Malay-dominant North Sumatra regency of Deli Serdang has led the local administration to jump into the sensitive issue on the side of the protestors.

The Deli Serdang administration has started to take measures to “arrange” the Karo roasted pork (BPK) eateries along the trans-Sumatra highway’s Medan to Lubuk Pakam section following a recent rally held by a number of Islamic organizations.

The head of the Deli Serdang Information and Communication Agency, Haris Binar Ginting, however, insisted that no BPK eateries, or other eateries selling non-halal foods, were closed during the process of “rearranging” their presence in the regency.

The rearrangement process, he said, took the form of disseminating “appeals” to all the managements of BPK eateries or eateries selling other non-halal foods to replace their current menus with halal ones. This, Haris said, was in accordance with Deli Serdang Decree No. 68/2016 on urban area spatial planning and the regency bylaw on public order.

Haris said there were a total of 13 eateries serving BPK or other non-halal foods along this section of the intercity road. He said members of the Muslim community protested against their presence because they considered them to be violating the decree and the bylaw.

“Thank God, almost 50 percent of them have replaced their menus with halal foods,” Haris told The Jakarta Post on Thursday.

Haris added that those that had not yet replaced their traditional foods with halal ones would still be given the opportunity to do so.

“The administration is ready to pay compensation if they are willing to change their servings,” Haris said, but he did not elaborate on the amount.

Last week hundreds of people from different Islamic organizations, like the Islam Defenders Front (FPI), staged a rally at the regency office, demanding the closure of all the BPK eateries including the famous BPK Tesalonika that has a prominent location on the trans-Sumatra highway at Kilometer 29. They also urged the regency administration to act quickly to close them down.

The protesters’ coordinator, Ibnu Hajar, who is also chairman of Muhammadiyah’s Deli Serdang branch, said the presence of the BPK eateries along that section of the highway was very disturbing to him because the majority of people living in the area were Muslims.

Ibnu said that they would not ban anyone from selling foods like BPK, but the sellers had to pay attention to their locations.

“Don’t sell non-halal foods like BPK in a Muslim neighborhood because it is not good. Please, look for other places. We will not stop them,” Ibnu told the Post on Thursday.

Separately Gunan Ginting Jawak, secretary of the Pemuda Merga Silima North Sumatra, a Karo ethnic youth organization, said on behalf of the owners of the BPK Tesalonika eatery that they would not close the business despite the rally.

Gunan said BPK had been a specialty of the Karo community for a long time and therefore it was impossible for them to replace it with other menu items.

“Eating pork for us has been a custom. It’s impossible to eliminate it,” Gunan told the Post, also on Thursday.

Responding to the accusation that the presence of BPK eateries in the area was against a regency decree and bylaw, Gunan said some of the eateries already had the required building licenses (IMB) to construct restaurants in the area. BPK Tesalonika, which was established in 2008, he added, even had an environmental impact analysis (Amdal) document.

“If we are banned, why were the building license and the Amdal document issued by the local administration?” asked Gunan, adding that it would not be easy for the administration to revoke the license because it had to be obtained through a court.