South Sulawesi Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Dicky Sondani said the police, however, were waiting for a police report, so that they could investigate the case against the Indonesian Muslim Brigade (BMI) that carried out the raid on the Gramedia bookstore at Trans Mall Makassar on the weekend, searching for books on communism. The group found three titles, including on Marxism and Leninism, and told the store to withdraw the books and return them to their respective publishers.

“The police will watch the BMI movement so that they will not take matters into their own hands again,” Dicky said.

He added that police had questioned BMI leader Muhammad Zulkifli on Monday and urged people to file police reports in the case.

Makassar State University School of Language and Literature lecturer Aslan Abidin said, “[The BMI] don’t have the right to conduct raids, much less ban the circulation of books.”

Aslan, who is also the founder of the Makassar Literature Institute, said people needed to read books on Karl Marx and Lenin because they presented theories that criticize capitalism as well as thoughts on science, the economy and sociology that would broaden people’s understanding.

“They should read the books so they will understand the content. Who can prove that the books are dangerous?” Aslan said.

BMI chairman Muhammad Zulkifli said the books had communist content and thus violated the Temporary People’s Consultative Assembly Decree (TAP MPRS) No. 25/1966 on the Indonesian Communist Party’s (PKI) disbandment and the ban on the spread of communism.

“That means the books are banned from circulation. That’s why we [conducted the raid] and called on Gramedia to withdraw [the books],” said Zulkifli when asked for confirmation on Sunday.

Last year, the group had done the same with books considered to contain communist content at another Gramedia bookstore located at Mal Panakkukang in Makassar. Zulkifli said they sought to free Makassar from Marxism and Leninism and claimed communism had begun to make a revival in the region.

“This for sure is dangerous for Makassar and for the country. We won’t let it happen,” Zulkifli said, adding that they believed the books had been used as a medium to promote communism.

Another literacy activist, Anwar Rachman Jimpe, said that, if the books were indeed considered dangerous, the group should take legal steps instead of taking matters into its own hands.

He said the literacy community in the region had been intensively campaigning to increase people’s reading interest. What the group did, he said, had caused unrest and could castrate Indonesia’s intellectual development.

“Let’s read the books and then have discussions, so we will understand the content,” said Anwar, who is also the founder of Makassar Book Village.

Both Aslan and Anwar urged the government to revoke TAP MPRS No. 25/1966, arguing that it had been used to ban books considered to contain communist content.

The bookstore’s spokesperson, Saiful Bahri, confirmed the raid, saying his side would not withdraw the titles as demanded by the group.

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