Indonesia: As govt suggests moving, Shiites ask why

Andy Irfan, the coordinator of human rights group Kontras Surabaya, said the government’s plan to relocate the Shiites showed that it was failing to protect its own citizens and failing to guarantee the religious freedom of the minority group.

Ahmadiyya Times | News Watch | Int'l Desk
Source/Credit: The Jakarta Post, Surabaya
By Indra Harsaputra | Januaqry 4, 2011

As an Indonesian citizen who happens to be a Shiite Muslim, Ahmad Jamali says he does not know why the police are stopping him from returning home after a group of purported Sunni Muslims burned down his community’s compound.

“Why should I move to another place when all my belongings and the future of my sons are there, in my village?” Ahmad Jamali said at the temporary shelter hosting 300 Shiites who fled from Sampang in Madura, East Java, after the attack last week.

East Java Deputy Governor Saifullah Yusuf said the government wanted to relocate the minority group to other places, possibly off the island, under a transmigration program to keep the Shiite community safe.


After five days in a refugee camp, however, Ahmad said everyone wanted to go home, pleading with the government to protect them.

“I am afraid that all the cattle and all the chickens are dead because I just left them. I can’t support my family because that’s the way I earn a living,” he said.

A group led by cleric Rois Alhukama reportedly attacked and burned down Shiite schools and homes in Karang Genyam village in Sampang.

The group claimed to represent Sunni Muslims, the majority Muslim group in Indonesia. Some 300 hundred Shiite residents, including 150 children, fled the village.

Andy Irfan, the coordinator of human rights group Kontras Surabaya, said the government’s plan to relocate the Shiites showed that it was failing to protect its own citizens and failing to guarantee the religious freedom of the minority group.

“Why don’t they just enforce the law and punish the perpetrators instead?” Andy said.

Separately, human rights activist Hendardi said that weak law enforcement by the government and security forces had emboldened certain groups that claimed to represent the mainstream to flout the law, as evinced by what has happened to Ahmadiyah members all over the country as well the ongoing saga of the Christian congregation of GKI Yasmin Church in Bogor, West Java.

Apparently afraid of a political backlash or cravenly seeking support from the majority, the government has neglected the pleas of many minority groups attacked by “thugs” claiming to represent “mainstream” Indonesia, Hendardi said.

Followers of Ahmadiyah in many parts of Indonesia have fled their homes after they were brutally attacked by Muslims for their different teachings.

Ahmadiyah members in Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara, for instance, have lived in a refugee camp for years following the destruction of their homes. There has been no action from the government to punish the perpetrators, return their homes or even to issue them official papers.

Meanwhile, the congregation of GKI Yasmin cannot hold services in their church compound, despite a Supreme Court ruling upholding their rights.

The East Java’s Institute for Children Protection (LPA) has built a clinic and a playground for the children in the refugee camp. “We try to help the children forget the trauma from the attacks,” LPA secretary Priyono Adi Nugroho said.

Tajul Muluk, a leader of the Shiite community in Madura, said that everyone would defend their right to stay on their own property.

“We reject the relocation plan as there is no guarantee of our safety. You see, we are not safe in our homeland, let alone in other places.”

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