Jakarta mulls banning Ahmadiyah

JAKARTA Fri, 03/04/2011 6:57 PM

Jakarta mulls banning Ahmadiyah

Andreas D. Aditya, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo has announced plans to follow in the footsteps of a number of regions that have issued bans to prevent members of the Ahmadiyah sect from practicing their religion in public.

“If ncecessary, we can even go further to not only issue a gubernatorial decree, but instead issue a bylaw on this. The administration will have a discussion with the City Council,” Fauzi said Friday.

Previously, East and West Java and South Sulawesi have issued such bans on the sect.

Fauzi said he planned to send officials to East and West Java to study their bans.

Calls for the banning of the Ahmadiyah sect and its teachings have been increasingly heard from various Muslim elements across Indonesia over the past few weeks.

Three members of the sect were brutally murdered and several others were seriously injured in a planned mob attack in Cikeusik, Pandeglang, Banten, last month.

Members of the sect have faced similar violence and discrimination in past attacks on their homes and property, including in Gegerung village, West Nusa Tenggara, where in February 2006 at least 12 Ahmadi families were forcibly evicted from their homes by local authorities and ordered to live in a refugee-style camp. (dre)

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URL: www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/03/04/grave...java.html

Grave of Ahmadi dug up in West Java

NATIONAL Fri, 03/04/2011 9:12 PM

Grave of Ahmadi dug up in West Java

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The remains of a deceased Ahmadiyah follower in Bandung, West Java, were found Thursday after his grave had allegedly been dug up shortly after his funeral.

“It happened [on Thursday]. It is true, the grave of [an Ahmadi] from the Buni Jaya chapter was dug up by unknown parties, and the corpse was just left there,” Ahmad Sulaeman from the Priangan Barat chapter of Jemaah Ahmadiyah Indonesia said Friday, as quoted by kompas.com.

Sulaeman said the remains were of an Ahmadi from Bogor named Ahmad Mulyadi, whose family had been from Buni Jaya, and thus requested he be buried there.

The remains had been brought from Bogor to Bandung for burial on Thursday.

After the funeral was finished at about 9.30 a.m, a group of people had come allegedly asking the cemetary keepers to dig up the grave again.

Priangan Barat Jemaah Ahmadiyah Indonesia coordinator said he deeply regretted the incident.

“… We hope the officers take legal action, especially because [this violates] the governor’s regulation. The regulation is said to set sanctions against people conducting acts of violence against Ahmadiyah followers,” Rafiq Ahmad said.

Under the regulation, Ahmadis are prohibited from conducting religious activities openly, and local residents are prohibited from carrying out acts of violence against them.

Copyright © 2008 The Jakarta Post - PT Bina Media Tenggara. All Rights Reserved
URL: www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/03/04/grave...java.html

Body of Ahmadiyah Follower Dug Up in Bandung

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Body of Ahmadiyah Follower Dug Up in Bandung

Antara & JG | March 04, 2011

An unidentified group of people has dug up the body of an Ahmadiyah follower in Bandung, West Java and left it abandoned in the graveyard.

The damaged tomb belonged to Mulyadi, 55, of Buni Jaya village who was buried on Thursday . Shortly after the burial, a group of men came and forced the gravedigger to take the body out of the tomb.

“It’s true that the tomb of our follower from Buni Jaya was dug out,” a spokesman for the Ahmadiyah congregation in Bandung, Ahmad Sulaeman said.

“He was from Bogor but his family lives in Buni Jaya and they wanted him to be buried there,” he added.

According to Ahmad, Mulyadi was buried at 9.30 a.m. on Thursday at Buni Jaya public cemetery. Half an hour later a group of men came and forced the grave digger to unearth the body and leave it in the grave yard. The family and a number of Ahmadiyah followers later took the body and buried it on the property of another Ahmadiyah follower.

A spokesman for the Indonesia Ahmadiyah Congregation (JAI), Firdaus Mubarik, told the Globe that the incident had dangerous implications.

“This is very dangerous because it shows that haters will do anything to attack Ahmadiyah,” he said, adding that he hoped the incident would not be repeated elsewhere.

“We will probably have to bury our followers on a special land, separate from the public cemetery. We already did it in East Lombok where the Ahmadiyah cemetery is side by side with a Christian cemetery,” Firdaus said.

The national secretary of Ahmadiyah Indonesia, Zafrullah Pontoh was at a loss for words when contacted by the Globe.

“I don’t know what else to say… It was a very bad thing, I just hope it won’t happen again,” he said.

Meanwhile, the coordinator of Bandung’s Ahmadiyah congregation, Rafiq, expressed regret for the incident.

“We are deeply troubled by this. We hope the police will catch the perpetrators and punish them because we consider this a violent act.”

Copyright 2010 The Jakarta Globe
URL: www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/body...bandung/426738

After East Java, West Java Bans All of Ahmadiyah’s Activities

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After East Java, West Java Bans All of Ahmadiyah’s Activities

Yuli Krisna & Eras Poke | March 04, 2011

Bandung. West Java joined a string of other regional governments on Thursday in banning activities of the Ahmadiyah sect.

West Java Governor Ahmad Heryawan said he issued a gubernatorial regulation, No. 12 of 2011, banning the activities of the Ahmadiyah in the province. He said it was effective immediately.

“This gubernatorial regulation is a follow-up to the joint ministerial decree and a 12-point joint agreement which was also signed by representatives of the Ahmadiyah,” Ahmad said.

He was referring to a 2008 joint ministerial decree that prohibits the Ahmadiyah from practicing their faith in public and spreading their beliefs. The decree, which stopped short of banning the sect altogether, has been criticized by human rights activists as it is frequently used to justify violence against the Ahmadiyah community.

The joint agreement Ahmad referred to was recently signed and outlined some of the prohibitions on Ahmadiyah activity.

He said the gubernatorial regulation was based on the desire of the government to prevent any social conflict from breaking out because of the activities of the Ahmadiyah, which many mainstream Muslims consider a deviant sect.

“We are not in a position to dissolve the Ahmadiyah organization, but we are in a position to follow up on the joint ministerial decree and the 12-point agreement,” h e said.

The regulation prohibits Ahmadis from trying to spread Ahmadiyah teachings orally, in writing or through electronic media. That also means all signboards containing the name of the organization must be taken down from public places, including mosques and schools. Ahmadiyah attributes may no longer be visible anywhere in West Java.

“Ahmadiyah mosques are mosques for all. All Muslims should be allowed to enter those mosques,” Ahmad said. He added that religious authorities will also organize Islamic events in mosques identified as Ahmadiyah mosques to put an end to alleged exclusivism there.

The West Java regulation forbids people from launching any unlawful action against the Ahmadiyah community, but it also calls on the public to help monitor and report any violation by Ahmadiyah members.

Saerodji, who heads the West Java office for religious affairs, said there were some 17,000 Ahmadis in the province.

Sugiyanto, head of the West Java High Prosecutor’s Office, said the regulation was aimed at protecting Ahmadis from the attacks they had experienced in the past.

“We want to protect the Ahmadiyah community from anarchic actions. If there are violations of the 12-point agreement, let the authorities deal with it,” Sugiyanto said.

“This is no longer a mere call but has been laid down into a written regulations. The public should not take matters into their own hands.”

West Java Police Chief Insp. Gen. Suparni Parto said the regulation was a good solution and added that police would now no longer hesitate to take action against whomever violated it.

The spokesman for the Ahmadiyah community in the western part of West Java, Rafiq Ahmad Sumadi Gandakusuma, told the Jakarta Globe they had not been invited to discuss the new regulation.

Earlier this week, authorities in Surabaya, the country’s second-largest city and capital of East Java, issued a similar regulation banning the display of any Ahmadiyah attributes and any efforts by the group to spread its faith in the province.

In the province of Banten, Lebak district recently said it would issue a bylaw banning the Ahmadiyah, and Pandeglang district already issued such a decree on Feb. 21.

Copyright 2010 The Jakarta Globe
URL: www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/after...activities/426642