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Violence in Jakarta as Muslims protest, demand Christian governor Ahok be jailed
Sydney Morning Herald - November 5, 2016
Jakarta police spokesman Awi Setiyono said one person had died from asthma and at least 12 police officers and four protesters were injured in the protests.
The protest was largely peaceful during the day however the mood soured after clashes between police and demonstrators on Friday night culminated in police using tear gas to disperse the remaining crowd outside the presidential palace.
Demonstrators threw stones and vehicles belonging to the police paramilitary force BRIMOB were set on fire. The head of the Islamic Students' Association (HMI), Mulyadi P Tamsir, denied the group started the fight with police, saying they had been planning to leave at 6pm but were hemmed in.
"There were around 1000 HMI members," he told Fairfax Media. "We were sitting about 30 to 100 metres from the broken barricade, we backed away immediately after the tear gas shooting. My eyes hurt, my face was hot, we scrambled for water to wash our faces. We backed away immediately. I don't have any reports yet if any of our members were hurt. It was a peace action, we stuck to that."
Mr Mulyadi said the fight had been initiated by a group next to them. "There was a small incident in the afternoon, some garbage, not tires, were burned, but it was put out immediately. It was a peace action."
The rally, spearheaded by the militant Islamic Defenders Front, came about because Muslim hardliners want Jakarta governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, widely known as Ahok, to be jailed for allegedly insulting the Koran.
About 20,000 police and military personnel secured the route of the demonstration in Central Jakarta amid fears it would be hijacked by extremists keen to foment violence.
Simultaneous protests took place in other Indonesian cities including Medan and Bengkulu.
"Arrest and try Ahok and his cronies dead or alive," read a sign suspended from Istiqlal mosque, the largest mosque in South East Asia.
Several embassies, including those from Australia and the US, had warned their citizens to stay away from the protests, and some schools in the capital closed.
Ahok is being investigated by police for alleged blasphemy after he appeared to suggest in an edited video transcript that voters were being deceived by a verse in the Koran.
Some Islamic groups had urged voters not to re-elect Ahok on the basis of verse 51 from the fifth sura or chapter of the Koran, al-Ma'ida, which some interpret as prohibiting Muslims from living under the leadership of a non-Muslim.
Others say the scripture should be understood in its context – a time of war – and not interpreted literally.
Ahok apologised for the offence caused by his comments and insisted he was not criticising the Koranic verse but those who used it to attack him. However many Muslims continue to call for him to be arrested and jailed.
Jakarta had been on tenterhooks in the days leading up to the protest, which had ignited ugly anti-Chinese sentiment throughout the country, and sparked fears of a repeat of the 1998 riots.
It is estimated more than 1000 people died in the 1998 riots which began as a protest against the Suharto regime but often targeted ethnic Chinese, looting and burning their shops.
Helicopters chakk-chakked over head on Friday as tens of thousands of protesters marched from Istiqlal Mosque towards the presidential palace in Jakarta.
At times it was impossible to move as the streets heaved with people. Demonstrators sang: "Hang Ahok, Hang Ahok, do it now" – to the tune of a popular birthday song urging that the cake be cut now.
The governor had this week told rally organisers they were welcome to protest as long as they didn't trample on the street gardens. "Don't step on the gardens, step on Ahok," yelled one man.
They brandished signs saying: "We love the police – punish the man who insults the Koran."
Dr Ratman, whose community house Rumah Amanah Rakyat prepared thousands of meals for protesters and coordinated 50 ambulances, said if the president did not ask the police to arrest Ahok, he should "step down like Suharto".
"People will not accept it if Ahok is free. He has insulted Islam and Islam is our belief. The best thing is for the President [Joko Widodo] to instruct the police to arrest Ahok before the worst happens," Dr Ratman told Fairfax Media.
"The President looks like he is protecting Ahok. Who is Ahok? What has he done for this country? Nothing."
Agah, from Cakung in East Jakarta, said he attended the rally to defend Islam and protest against religious defamation. He said according to Islamic law the punishment for religious defamation was stoning.
"We do not apply Islamic law so he must be legally processed with a minimum imprisonment of 10 years," Agah said.
Vice-President Jusuf Kalla tweeted on Friday evening that he would meet representatives from the rally at his office. Ahok had spent the day campaigning in a Chinese part of North Jakarta.
President Jokowi, who will this weekend travel to Australia, spent the day working as usual. He received two ministers in the morning and then inspected the progress of the airport train in the afternoon.
In the absence of any violent incidents earlier in the day, television coverage of the demonstration reverted to colour stories, such as a 35 per cent increase in the profit turned by street vendors.
Ian Wilson, from the Asia Research Centre at Murdoch University, said it was important to consider some of the context of the protests. He said since taking office as governor in 2014, Ahok had presided over one of the most aggressive eviction campaigns in the modern history of the city.
"What many have failed to consider, or simply ignored, is the massive groundswell of anger and resentment generated by this policy regime. It has spread far beyond the tens of thousands directly impacted through extended family, friends, neighbours and social, cultural and work networks," he wrote in New Mandala.
"Reliable statistics on the numbers directly affected are difficult to come by. However, reports compiled by the Jakarta Legal Aid Foundation estimate that more than 16,000 overwhelmingly poor and working class families have been displaced in the past two years alone. Only 30 per cent have been offered any alternative accommodation, the social and economic impacts of which have been devastating."
"This anger has, unsurprisingly, sought to find avenues of expression and amelioration."
[With Karuni Rompies and Amilia Rosa.]
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