An Indonesian mass organization, the New Direction Movement (Garbi), led by senior members of the Islamist Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), is about to become a political party.
n Indonesian mass organization, the New Direction Movement (Garbi), led by senior members of the Islamist Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), is about to become a political party, thus possibly competing against its more established "elder brother".
House of Representatives deputy speaker and PKS politician Fahri Hamzah announced the plans on a popular television talk show, the Indonesian Lawyer’s Club.
“Insyaallah [God willing] we will declare Garbi a political party to criticize the old direction in Indonesia that is frozen, stiff and boring,” he said on Tuesday night.
Garbi initiator and former PKS chairman Anis Matta already said on July 5 that the organization would become a political party within a year.
Anis, who was ousted from the top spot during the party’s national congress in 2015, and his loyalists, including Fahri and other top PKS politicians such as Mahfudz Siddiq, Jazuli Juwaini, Sukamta and Mahfudz Abdurrahman, make up the bulk of Garbi's leadership.
Fahri has also been in a dispute with his party since April 2016, when PKS chairman Sohibul Iman dismissed him from it through a written statement. The PKS claimed Fahri often made controversial statements that contradicted official party stances.
Fahri said that Garbi would be a party that “breaks out from the stigmas that diminish the potential of our nation,” he told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
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