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ights activists and religious leaders have urged President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to dismiss Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali for his frequent statements that could fuel persecution against minority groups in the country.

“Suryadharma doesn’t deserve the post because he has encouraged discrimination against Shiite by saying that the sect is heretical. As a minister, he speaks on behalf of the government, and his statement could be taken to indicate that the government legitimizes violations against Shia [followers],” said Setara Institute chairman Hendardi on Friday.

Suryadharma, who also chairs the Muslim-oriented United Development Party (PPP), said after a meeting with the House of Representatives’ Commission VIII overseeing religion, that the Shia branch of Islam was heretical because it deviated from the main Islamic teachings.

Iranian Ambassador to Indonesia Mahmoud Farazandeh said that he expected to hold a meeting with Suryadharma to clarify his statement.

“I haven’t heard anything from him directly so I don’t know what he meant. I must see him first and listen to his explanation before commenting on his statement,” he said.

Shia is the official state religion of Iran, subscribed to by almost 95 percent of the population, while Indonesia is the world’s most populous Sunni Muslim majority country.

Noted Muslim intellectual Azyumardi Azra said that Suryadharma’s statement only added to the already numerous burdens shouldered by the Yudhoyono administration.

“The minister has encouraged radicalism. The statement can be used as an excuse by Sunnis, whose form of Islam was introduced by the Wahabbis from Saudi Arabia, to use violence against Shiites,” he said.

The Setara Institute and other rights groups had called upon Yudhoyono to replace Suryadharma in the period leading up to the recent Cabinet reshuffle last year, because of what was perceived as his ill-informed comments on minority groups.

Previously, Suryadharma had made similar accusations about the Islamic Ahmadiyah sect, which he also deemed heretical, and called on Ahmadis to return to the true teachings of Islam.

Setara researcher Ismail Hasani said the public could be forgiven for thinking that Suryadharma was targeting minority groups in the country.

He predicted that the Baha’i branch of Islam could be next.

“After an attack on Ahmadis in Cikeusik, Banten, in February last year, we warned that similar actions may be carried out against followers of Shia and Baha’i because these religious groups are not considered part of mainstream Islam in Indonesia,” he said.

Ismail said that Yudhoyono’s government should issue a statement to refute Suryadharma’s statement.

“The government must immediately make a statement to counter the minister’s comments; otherwise, the public will believe that Suryadharma spoke out on behalf of the state,” Ismail said

In late-December last year, Sunni followers burned down a Shiite compound in Karang Gayam, Madura; an attack believed to have been orchestrated to drive the Shiite community out of the village.

Earlier in 2010, Syahroni, a leader of a Baha’i community in Lampung Timur, Lampung, was jailed on criminal charges of teaching and proselytizing Muslim children in the neighborhood. (msa)