Indonesia's moral defenders take a swipe
at sin By Bill Guerin
JAKARTA - Indonesia's self-appointed guardians of
morality, the once disbanded radical Islamic Defenders'
Front (FPI), have once again resorted to violence in the
nation's capital, Jakarta.
The first attack came
late Friday night when around 300 FPI storm troopers
broke into the Star Deli restaurant in the elite
residential and entertainment district of Kemang in
South Jakarta. The restaurant had closed, after being
tipped off by the police, but the FPI cadres smashed the
windows and chairs. No one was injured in the attack,
which, it is claimed, police did nothing to stop.
On Saturday the US Embassy issued a statement
warning Americans in Indonesia to take precautions
against such attacks, raising fears that the "sweeping"
could affect tourism prospects. Jakarta Police quickly
deployed 600 Mobile Brigade members and 500 officers to
patrol the streets of the capital, with Jakarta police
chief, Inspector General Firman Gani, saying the vandalism
was "out of line" and definitely a violation of the law.
FPI spokesman Alawi Usman, however, was quick to
defend the group's actions. "We are against immorality,"
he told foreign reporters the day after the Star Deli
attack. "We are doing this for the future of the
country's youth."
The FPI has a history of
attacking places of "recreation" where they believe
prostitution or gambling is taking place. In the past
they have closed down brothels, burned entertainment
centers and physically attacked sex workers. Their
leader, Al-Habib Muhammad Rizieq bin Hussein Syihab,
more popularly called Habib Rizieq, spent several months
in prison last year for orchestrating attacks on
"iniquitous" nightspots, bars and cafes in 2001.
Though the nightlife business rubs them up the
wrong way all year round, the radicals reserve their
main impetus for the fasting month of Ramadhan. Two
weeks ago the FPI warned that they would once again take
the law into their own hands if city officials failed to
close the countless pubs, discotheques and massage
parlors they deem as "sinful places".
Other
Muslim groups, including the Indonesian Mujahiddin
Council (MMI), Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia, the Indonesian
Islamic Students Association (PII) and Indonesian Muslim
Action Student Front (KAMMI), also demanded nightspots
close during Ramadhan.
Though some 89% of
Indonesia's 220 million people are Muslims, many do not
strictly follow the tenets of Islam, preferring to
combine the religion with traditional spiritual and
cultural beliefs. However, Muslims are forbidden to eat,
drink, smoke, and engage in sexual intercourse from
sunrise until sunset during the fasting month.
Jakarta Governor Sutiyoso's response to threats
by the FPI that they would, as in the past, not focus
their minds on fasting but on raids on nightspots, was
that such acts would only tarnish the city's image and
mar the peace of Ramadhan.
Though the pleasure
palaces have occasionally been ordered to close for the
whole month in the past, despite complaints about loss
of business, this year the Jakarta city council did what
it usually does - compromise, in the wider interests of
the population at large, by limiting their hours of
operation for the month.
Warning that only the
police or appointed government institutions had the
authority to raid entertainment centers, Sutiyoso issued
a decree allowing the nightspots, often frequented by
foreigners, to open in the hours after the breaking of
the fast and prior to the meal before sunrise.
However, alcohol can be sold and drunk, and
these establishments remain open, during the rest of the
year. The reasons for double standards by local
administrations, in enforcing the law and upholding
Islamic teachings, are not difficult to understand. The
"illegal" sex business is now a major industry that
directly or indirectly contributes to employment,
national income and economic growth, although it remains
against the law.
Authorities collect substantial
revenues in areas where prostitution thrives, both
illegally from bribes and corruption, but also legally
from licensing fees and taxes on the many hotels, bars,
restaurants and the like that flourish in its wake.
Many observers expected the FPI threat to be a
hollow one this year. After all, new president Susilo
Bambang Yudhoyono, widely expected to give a much higher
priority to security issues and improve the country's
image in the eyes of the international world, was
inaugurated during the first week of Ramadhan, which
lasts until mid-November.
Despite this, FPI
paramilitary troops "visited" several restaurants and
cafes across the capital and in the metropolitan
districts of Tangerang, Bekasi, and Depok last week in a
series of "sweeping processions". Then on Friday the
first act of violence occurred when the Star Deli
restaurant was attacked.
The outward face of a
gentle and traditional Muslim-dominated Indonesian
society has long been at odds with the stark reality
that overt sexuality and drug use have exploded since
the early days of the regional financial crisis.
The FPI leadership claims the organization's
long-term aim is to rid the country of alcohol, drugs,
gambling and prostitution and that they only attack
places that blatantly operate in defiance of community
standards.
Many Indonesians, however, see the
movement as largely made up of preman (thugs).
Critics claim that extorting money from frightened bar
owners is their primary motive, rather than defending
Islamic principles and cleansing society. It is also
claimed that the group has been in cahoots with police
and soldiers, even in competition with them, to extort
protection money from owners of nightspots.
Even
Pemuda Pancasila, a rival vigilante group that ran
protection rackets in the Suharto days, has accused the
FPI of raiding bars and clubs that do not pay sufficient
protection money. In 2001 and 2002 the FPI carried out
violent attacks on Jakarta's Jalan Jaksa - a street
frequented by foreign backpackers and sex workers.
Claiming to defend Islam, the FPI spontaneously
declared itself a "party" on August 17, 1998, during the
unrest shortly after Suharto's downfall. In November of
that year the group hit the streets with some 2,500
machete-wielding men to help military-backed civilian
security forces secure the general session of the 1998
People's Consultative Assembly (MPR). The president at
the time, BJ Habibie, was supported not only by the FPI
but also by mainstream Islam, including many Islamic
leaders who had supported Suharto in the last five years
of his rule.
However, Juwono Sudarsono,
appointed defense minister last week by president
Yudhoyono, recalled later that there were elements of
the police and the military intent on undermining
Habibie's authority. In any event, hundreds of
students, together with pro-democracy activists,
claiming the session was simply a means to legalize the
Habibie leadership, marched to the parliament building
to express their demands for reform.
The
demonstrators kept troops tied down for hours but then
dispersed to avoid the FPI. As they regrouped nearby,
and while troops and police relaxed, the FPI members,
wielding their machetes, marched toward the
demonstrators and laid into them.
The FPI later
claimed that their presence at the parliament building
was to boost moral and character reforms. "If the morals
and characters are not reformed then it would be useless
to talk about reform in economy, political affairs, and
law," FPI leader Rizieq said.
In 2002 the FPI
was the largest group of demonstrators in front of the
US Embassy in Jakarta when the bombing of Afghanistan
began and promised to send volunteers to defend fellow
Muslims against the American offensive.
Along
with other radical groups Hizbut Tahrir (Party of
Struggle) and the Gerakan Pemuda Islam (Islamic Youth
Movement), the FPI took to the streets in March last
year in a show of strength to protest against the
invasion of Iraq, threatening to attack Westerners.
Prior to the Bali blasts in October 2002, which
claimed more than 200 lives, the authorities appeared to
turn a blind eye to the FPI's raids, lending credence to
claims that the organization was backed by powerful
officials in the security forces.
Though Rizieq
was arrested four days after the Bali blasts, he was
quickly released and placed under house arrest after the
FPI announced publicly that it had decided to call it a
day and refrain from "further tarnishing the image of
Islam". Laskar Jihad, another, more violent Islamic
militia, disbanded around the same time. In January 2003
that group's leader, Jafar Umar Thalib, was acquitted on
charges of fomenting religious violence in the Maluku
islands and inciting hatred of the government and
then-president Megawati Sukarnoputri.
Megawati
had walked a thin tightrope, trying to juggle and
balance the needs of her country in terms of a secure
and safe environment for investment, with the threats
posed to Indonesia's vast majority of peace-loving
Muslims by the radicalized few, who alleged she was
siding with the Americans in adopting anti-terrorism
policies.
Sudarsono, the first civilian defense
minister in four decades, when serving under former
president Abdurrahman Wahid from October 1999 to August
2000, is on record as saying that the Megawati
government's firm stance against terrorism was being
deliberately manipulated by Islamic groups to encourage
its perception as being "against Islam".
Nonetheless, Megawati started to crack down on
Islamic extremism, despite concerns that any move
against hardline Muslims, such as Abu Bakar Ba'asyir,
would be politically divisive at a time when she clearly
needed support from Muslim parties if she was to win
another term.
Ba'asyir, the alleged spiritual
leader of Jemaah Islamiyah, was arrested, tried and
sentenced to four years in jail for treason. The aging
cleric is now awaiting trial in connection with the Bali
bombings. Several of his followers are among those
convicted of involvement in those bombings, with
sentences ranging from three years to death.
At
the opening of his trial in May 2003, Rizieq denied any
wrongdoing and defended his actions, claiming they were
in line with religious and state laws. He said managers
of "immoral" nightspots and the police who protect them
were the ones who should be on trial.
Rizieq
broke the terms of his house arrest status on April 8 by
leaving Indonesia. He was subsequently arrested upon his
return to Jakarta on April 20. The following day his
supporters helped him escape from police custody at a
public prosecutor's office, but he later surrendered and
was sent to jail, though claiming that his detention was
the result of a conspiracy between police and the
operators of illegal gambling dens.
He was
sentenced to seven months behind bars for inciting
public unrest and insulting the government. Released
from jail in November last year, Rizieq told a crowd of
cheering supporters he would continue his campaign for
the imposition of Islamic law and the closure of
entertainment venues deemed an affront to Islam.
Young urbanites from the lower strata of society
make up the majority of FPI followers. Most are not well
educated, and many are unemployed. Though the rhetoric
and violence may be appealing to these Muslims, it is
not winning broad support among the Muslim community.
Those calling for violence and aggression in Indonesia
are still preaching in a wilderness.
Even the
Indonesian Ulamas Council (Majelis Ulama Indonesia or
MUI), Indonesia's highest authority on Islamic matters,
said in a statement on Sunday that the actions of the
FPI "would tarnish the reputation of Islam".
"Leave the matter to the police," Admiral
Widodo, the coordinating minister for political, legal
and security affairs, said after a security meeting on
Sunday. "Only the police have the authority to take
legal measures" against violators of a law, he said,
adding that the government was responsible for
protecting both foreigners and Indonesians.
But
Darmawan, leader of the Kemang community forum, has
promised to take the fight to the streets. Kemang is
home to hundreds of foreign businessmen and wealthy
Indonesians, including those who operate businesses and
are not necessary Muslims. "We don't want this
neighborhood, where we make our livings, to be
destroyed. We will defend it with all our might,"
Darmawan was quoted as saying.
FPI commander
Jafar Sidiq, however, was not impressed, warning that
the raids would continue, since "the authority is lax in
its supervision".
Bill Guerin has
worked for 19 years in Indonesia as a journalist and
editor. He specializes in business/economy issues and
political analysis related to Indonesia. He has been a
Jakarta correspondent for Asia Times Online since 2000
and has also been published by the BBC on East Timor. He
can be reached at softsell@prima.net.id.
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