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Indonesia's police deny they are afraid to tackle hardline Islamic leader
Sydney Morning Herald - January 16, 2017
But if the group, once considered fringe radicals, have become increasingly vocal, it is their leader, firebrand cleric Muhammad Rizieq Shihab, who some fear may have become too powerful for the police to touch.
Widely known as Habib Rizieq, he is being investigated over multiple reports of alleged blasphemy and slander, including his outlandish claim that the 100,000 rupiah note contains an image of the hammer and sickle, which is illegal in Indonesia.
A daughter of Indonesia's first president Sukarno has also reported him for allegedly insulting the state ideology, Pancasila, which carries a maximum sentence of five years' jail.
Habib Rizieq is yet to be named a suspect, however Jakarta police chief Muhammad Iriawan denied at a press conference that the police lacked the courage to do so. He said Habib Rizieq would also be summoned soon over his claims regarding the banknote.
"We have the law about hate speech," Iriawan said. "The Central Bank has said it isn't a hammer and sickle. It's called retroverso, a system to protect the money."
Iriawan said Habib Rizieq would also be summoned for allegedly insulting Christianity when he told Muslims in a sermon on Christmas Day: "If Jesus is the son of God, who is the midwife?"
Iriawan said the mass protests deployed by the FPI were not a factor in police decisions: "The state cannot be pressured."
It was a poster ridiculing Pancasila at an army base in Perth that was the catalyst for Indonesian military chief Gatot Nurmantyo's decision to partially suspend defence ties with Australia.
The FPI and Habib Rizieq's Twitter accounts – @DPP_FPI and @syihabrizieq – were suspended ahead of FPI's march to Indonesian police headquarters on Monday morning. Police deployed 2800 personnel to secure the protest.
The FPI had called for West Java police chief Anton Charliyan to be sacked, alleging he had incited thugs to attack FPI sympathisers when Habib Rizieq was summoned last Thursday to be questioned over the allegations that he insulted Pancasila.
Sukmawati Sukarnoputri had reported him to police for allegedly insulting Pancasila and Sukarno.
There are mounting concerns about an Islamist challenge to Indonesian President Joko Widodo's government as sectarian tensions simmer ahead of next month's gubernatorial elections.
The incumbent, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, an ethnic Chinese Christian universally known as Ahok, is standing trial for blasphemy over allegations he insulted Islam. He returns to court on Tuesday but the trial will drag on long after the February 15 elections.
Three mass protests – spearheaded by the FPI – were held last year demanding Ahok be jailed, with the final December 4 rally attracting an estimated 500,000 to 600,000 people. Another demonstration is planned for next month.
Iriawan said police could still handle security at these mass actions. Pressed on if it was worrying, he said: "Not yet [but] it's heading that way."
Tobias Basuki from the Centre for the Strategic and International Studies said the Indonesian government saw that intolerance was on the rise and the FPI was leading political Islam.
He said as an academic he opposed blasphemy laws and the defamation provisions in the electronic information and transaction (ITE) laws because they were often used against political opponents. However he said the FPI had been running rampant without repercussions.
One of Indonesia's most senior cabinet ministers, Luhut Pandjaitan, a close ally of the president, was last week asked by reporters if the FPI should be disbanded.
"We will rely on the law, so if a person is breaking the law, we can take action," he said. "For example, if a person hasn't paid his taxes that's a crime. So there are many means, many ways."
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