[O]nly the An-Nur and At-Taqwa mosques had encountered obstacles getting building permits from the city administration and been forced to deal with intolerant groups of people.
Source/Credit: The Jakarta Post,
By The Jakarta Post | July 22, 2015
Among a line of empty houses on Jl. Madrasah 1 in Duren Sawit, East Jakarta, on Friday morning, a two-story green building was crowded with dozens of men and women flocking onto its porch and into its front yard.
Wearing Muslim clothes, like the baju koko (long-sleeve collarless shirt for men) and gamis (long skirt), the group of Ahmadis smiled brightly while shaking each other’s hands.
“Happy Idul Fitri. Allah bless all of us,” a middle-aged follower said warmly to a younger fellow Ahmadi.
Around 40 Ahmadi community members had just performed the Idul Fitri prayer in the green building that also served as an Ahmadiyah mosque. Named the At-Taqwa Mosque, the place was a grant from Abdul Somad and his family who had moved to another place.
“This place has been used for performing Friday and Idul Fitri prayers since 2000,” Aryudi Muhammad Shadiq, the head of the East Jakarta branch of the Ahmadiyah community, told The Jakarta Post.
He said in 2011 an intolerant group intimidated the community and shortly after that the city administration sealed the mosque, saying that the building was not being used in an appropriate way. The Ahmadiyah community in the area, he said, has been trying to take care of the administrative process to legalize the building as a mosque, but to no avail.
The At-Taqwa Mosque is not the Ahmadis’ only praying house in Jakarta that has been sealed by the city administration. On July 8, the South Jakarta Administration sealed the An-Nur Mosque in Bukit Duri, South Jakarta, following protests from people claiming to be local residents and a Muslim group wearing Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) uniforms.
“A number of our members from Bukit Duri have been praying here [in Duren Sawit] since the incident, along with those from Kramat Jati [in East Jakarta],” Aryudi said, adding that Ahmadis had eight mosques in Jakarta, including on Tidung Island in the Thousand Islands regency.
He said only the An-Nur and At-Taqwa mosques had encountered obstacles getting building permits from the city administration and been forced to deal with intolerant groups of people.
Muhammad Diantono, an Ahmadi preacher from the An-Nur Mosque, said the recent dispute in Bukit Duri did not affect the peacefulness of the Idul Fitri prayers this year.
“We have become accustomed to being intimidated and confronted since many years ago,” he said, adding that the community had experienced worse incidents than a mosque closure.
Ahmadis have been the target of violent attacks from hard-line Islamic groups in Indonesia since 2005. (agn) -
Read original post here: Indonesia: Ahmadis perform Idul Fitri prayer peacefully
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