“I want to go home. I am hungry. Thank you,” Jakarta Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama, who is on leave to campaign, told reporters after being questioned for about nine hours at the National Police headquarters in South Jakarta on Monday.

Ahok looked tired. Accompanied by his lawyers and advisors, including legislator Ruhut Sitompul, Ahok refused to answer questions from reporters who had been waiting for him since morning.

“I think [my lawyer’s statement] is very clear, and if you have further questions, please ask the police investigators,” he responded briefly when asked about the topics covered by his interrogation.

This was Ahok’s second visit to the police office. On his own initiative, he went there on Oct. 25 to clarify his position concerning the blasphemy allegations made by a group of Muslim organizations. At that time, police asked 18 questions, and on Monday, Ahok had to answer 22 more.

“So in total there were 40 questions,” said Ruhut, who identified himself as Ahok’s spokesman.

Sirra Prayuna, Ahok’s lead counsel, said his client provided “good answers” to the questions. Sirra leads Ahok’s legal team, which consists of dozens of legal experts.

Ahok, who is currently seeking to retain his office through the Feb. 15 gubernatorial election, was reported by a number of Islamic organizations for a speech in which he mentioned Surah al-Maidah, Verse 51 of the Quran, while visiting the Thousand Islands regency in late September.

His reference to the verse was believed by a number of Muslim groups to be an insult to the Islamic scripture, which prompted a mass rally on Friday.

Demonstrators demanded police immediately arrest Ahok on allegations of blasphemy. Ahok has made a public apology for his statement, but the protesters refused to accept it. Ahok insisted, however, that his remarks had been selectively edited.

Vice President Jusuf Kalla told representatives of the protesters on Friday that police would conclude the investigation within two weeks when it would be decided if the case could be brought to court.

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo ordered National Police chief Gen. Tito Karnavian to conduct the case screening in an open manner, especially as it would be covered live by TV stations.

National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. Agus Rianto said great transparency would ensure that the mission of the police was solely to uphold the truth.

“If we allow everyone to see the case screening, people will see that there is no intervention in this case,” Agus told reporters.

A case screening is one of the phases of a criminal investigation, during which it is decided if the case is solid enough for the police to name someone a suspect, or if they should drop the case and clear the accused party of all charges.

Meanwhile, another police spokesman, Sr. Comr. Rikwanto, said it was not impossible for the case to be dropped as the police found that the length of the speech had been cut by the uploader of the circulated video.  

“The video has been cut or edited because the duration of Ahok’s speech at that time was more than one hour. The uploader only took some parts of it,” Rikwanto said after Ahok’s interrogation. “But then again, we need to see the case screening results first.”

Popular

Indonesia one step from Olympics after beating South Korea

Opposition weakens as rivals pledge support for Prabowo

Golden generation