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Dear President Prabowo, please end religious intolerance in Indonesia
The state has played a major role in perpetuating discrimination and persecution against religious minorities with its draconian regulations.
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An anti-Ahmadiyya banner is seen on Jun 24, 2017, near an Ahmadiyya mosque in Sawangan, Depok, West Java. (Courrtesy of Tim Pembela Kebebasan Sipil/-)
W
e have once again seen the ugly face of religious intolerance in the country as scores of members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim minority group , including women and children, were denied access to safe shelters upon arriving in Kuningan regency in West Java last week to attend a mass gathering called Jalsah Salanah.
Not only did local authorities block access to Manislor village, where the three-day event was supposed to take place from Friday to Sunday, but police officers, who according to prevailing regulations should ensure religious minorities’ safety, appeared to be the main actors behind the expulsion of thousands of Indonesian Ahmadiyya Congregation (JAI) members, who had traveled from various parts of the country. Around 15,000 people were expected to attend the gathering.
Firdaus Mubarik from the JAI said the police forcibly dismantled the tents they slept in on Thursday night, leading most of the congregation to flee in the rain. Some videos distributed online showed children crying in the dark of the night while their parents looked confused, not knowing where to go.
The Ahmadiyya community sent notification letters to local authorities, obtained permission from the village head months earlier and invested a great deal of money and effort to organize the Jalsah Salanah, but instead received a last-minute notification from the Kuningan administration that the event was banned.
Armed forces even besieged Manislor, which is home to over 3,000 Ahmadiyya followers, making the villagers “feel like terrorists”. Some aspiring Jalsah Salanah participants who managed to make their way to the village were reportedly intimidated by security personnel.
Should this horrendous scenario really happen in a country that has for decades proudly declared itself “pluralistic” and upholds a national motto of Bhinneka Tunggal Ika or unity in diversity?
From my experience during my graduate studies on religion in the United Kingdom last year, I learned that the international community largely sees Indonesia as a peaceful Muslim-majority country that also hosts other groups of religious minorities, from Christians, Hindus and Confucianists to followers of indigenous beliefs; compared to the situation in the Middle East or South Asia, where bloody interreligious conflict seems to be rampant.
