Entering the last days of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s term in office, rights group the Setara Institute has highlighted his failure in promoting and defending harmony among interfaith groups in the country.
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Headlines | Tue, October 14 2014, 7:26 AM
Entering the last days of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s term in office, rights group the Setara Institute has highlighted his failure in promoting and defending harmony among interfaith groups in the country.
Setara Institute chairman Hendardi said Monday that Yudhoyono, who first assumed office in 2004, carried out his policies in a paradoxical way by flaunting the country’s pluralism at international forums, while refusing to address flagrant displays of intolerance on the ground.
“The President exploited the issue [of pluralism] to obtain support from other countries, claiming that Indonesia was a role model, but in fact he could have done a lot more,” Hendardi told reporters at a press conference on Monday.
Based on the institute’s data, more than 200 cases related to religious intolerance were reported every year for the past few years, and most of them were never processed through legal channels.
“Actually Yudhoyono, who has received awards for his contribution to pluralism, could have directly resolved these cases or, at least, contributed to the process but sadly he opted to stay silent,” Hendardi said.
President Yudhoyono received the World Statesmen Award a from New York-based interfaith organization, the Appeal of Conscience Foundation (ACF), last year for his efforts to promote religious freedom in the country.
Various reports, however, have shown increasing incidents of religious intolerance across the country.
Another report from the Wahid Institute, which promotes pluralism and peaceful Islam, reported that such incidents had increased during his 10 years in office.
The report showed religious intolerance cases in 2012 stood at 274, up from 267 in 2011. In 2010, the institute recorded 184 cases, while 121 cases were recorded in 2009.
Yudhoyono is considered as having failed to deal with cases involving minority groups, such as attacks against Ahmadiyah followers in Ciekusik, Banten, in February 2011, and against Shiites in Sampang, East Java, in August 2012.
Yudhoyono also failed to act when the West Java administration sealed the Indonesian Christian Church (GKI) Yasmin in Bogor, despite a ruling by the Supreme Court in December 2010 stating that the church’s permit was valid.
Bonar Tigor Naipospos, the Setara Institute’s deputy chairman, said that Yudhoyono had also displayed a narrow perspective regarding other human rights cases by claiming that no serious human rights violations took place during his tenure.
“Human rights violations are not limited to military action, as happened during [former president] Soeharto’s era. He should know that religious intolerance and the unsolved murder of human rights defender Munir are also examples of serious human rights violations,” Bonar said.
Munir Said Thalib died from arsenic poisoning on Sept. 7, 2004, during a Garuda Indonesia flight to the Netherlands.
Law enforcers have failed to find the mastermind behind the murder, while the courts sentenced only two perpetrators, Garuda pilot Pollycarpus Budihari Priyanto and former Garuda president Indra Setiawan, to 20 years and 12 years in prison, respectively.
Meanwhile, Muchdi Purwoprandjono, a former deputy chairman of the National Intelligence Agency (BIN) who was accused of involvement in the case, was acquitted in 2009 of all charges.
Bonar added that Munir’s case was a historic test for Yudhyono, as he could have been remembered for his great contribution if the case had been solved under his watch. “Our President, however, failed the test,” Bonar said. (idb)