Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Membatalkan Warisan Sektarian dan Intoleransi Yudhoyono

Andreas Harsono
Satu Islam

Warga Ahmadiyah dalam masjid Ahmadiyah dibakar di Cianjur (Januari 2014) 


Warisan Presiden Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono adalah intoleransi dan kekerasan atas nama agama di Indonesia. Ini akan jadi salah satu tantangan terbesar presiden penggantinya sesudah warga Indonesia melaksanakan pemilihan presiden 9 Juli mendatang.

Yudhoyono gemar bicara “kerukunan beragama” di Indonesia. Kenyataannya, selama 10 tahun pemerintahannya, kaum minoritas agama-agama di Indonesia, termasuk Ahmadiyah, Kristen, Sufi, Syiah, dan agama pribumi, posisinya semakin dikepung oleh aksi kekerasan kelompok militan Islam Sunni. Tanggapan Yudhoyono? Dia bicara sebatas retorika dan terkesan menutup mata terhadap  tindakan jajaran pemerintahnya, yang secara pasif atau aktif, terlibat pelanggaran hak beribadah minoritas.

Berbagai kelompok Sunni militan terbiasa menyerang kelompok minoritas dan praktis kebal hukum. Dalam kasus-kasus tertentu, di mana pejabat daerah, polisi, dan jaksa turun tangan, hasilnya seringkali terjadi tuntutan dan pemenjaraan individu-individu minoritas –bukan pelaku kekerasan– dengan tuduhan “penodaan agama” atau “menciptakan keresahan masyarakat.”

Data pelanggaran kebebasan beragama di Indonesia dari Setara Institute

Tahun

Jumlah Tindakan

2007

91

2008

257

2009

181

2010

216

2011

242

2012

264

2013

220


Akar meningkatnya intoleransi dan kekerasan agama mulai pada Juli 2005 ketika Yudhoyono membuka musyawarah nasional Majelis Ulama Indonesia dengan mengumumkan, “… MUI untuk berperan secara sentral yang menyangkut aqidah ke-Islaman … mana-mana yang pemerintah atau negara sepatutnya mendengarkan fatwa dari MUI dan para ulama.” Pada Maret 2006 kabinet Yudhoyono membuat  aturan tentang “Kerukunan Umat Beragama, Pemberdayaan Forum Kerukunan Umat Beragama, dan Pembangunan Rumah Ibadah.”

Peraturan tersebut memberikan dasar pembentukan ratusan Forum Kerukunan Umat Beragama di 33 provinsi dan sekitar 500 kota serta kabupaten. Tugasnya, penasehat gubernur, walikota dan bupati soal “kerukunan umat beragama.” Aturan tersebut menetapkan bahwa anggota FKUB harus mencerminkan “komposisi agama” di setiap daerah. Akibatnya, agama yang dominan di setiap daerah –Islam Sunni di sebelah barat Indonesia termasuk Jawa dan Sumatra dan Kristen di beberapa pulau di kawasan timur– memiliki mayoritas anggota dalam FKUB daerah (17 orang untuk sebuah kabupaten atau kota) atau FKUB provinsi (maksimal 21 anggota).

Kenyataannya, peraturan tersebut mengekang kebebasan beragama serta membuat sulit kegiatan pembangunan, dalam beberapa kasus juga renovasi, rumah ibadah. Menurut aturan tersebut buat membangun rumah ibadah syaratnya:
  • Tanda tangan setuju dan dan KTP minimal 90 orang yang akan menggunakan rumah ibadah. Ia harus disahkan kepala desa;
  • Tanda tangan dukungan dan KTP minimal 60 orang yang tinggal di daerah tersebut. Ia harus disahkan kepala desa;
  • Rekomendasi dari Kementerian Agama;
  • Rekomendasi dari FKUB.
Peraturan tersebut adalah diskriminasi terhadap usaha pembangunan rumah ibadah agama minoritas. Dalam beberapa kasus yang didokumentasikan Human Rights Watch, aturan tersebut dipakai gerombolan intoleran menghalangi jemaat Kristen melakukan renovasi gedung-gedung gereja mereka. Berbagai kelompok Islam memakai aturan tersebut guna mendesak pemerintah bongkar gereja baru. Pada 21 Maret 2013, pemerintah Bekasi menggunakan excavator untuk hancurkan bangunan Huria Kristen Batak Protestan di daerah Taman Sari. Bupati Bekasi Neneng Hasanah Yasin memerintahkan gereja dibongkar karena tak ada izin bangunan –sesuatu yang sulit sekali dalam aturan rezim Yudhoyono– sesuai desakan Forum Umat Islam Taman Sari.

Persekutuan Gereja-gereja di Indonesia, payung berbagai gereja Protestan, menyimpulkan bahwa aturan 2006 buatan Yudhoyono lebih represif dari peraturan sejenis tahun 1969 buatan pemerintahan Presiden Soeharto.

Sejak berkuasa pada 2004, Yudhoyono juga menggunakan aturan “penodaan agama” buatan Presiden Soekarno pada Januari 1965 dengan agresif. Keputusan Soekarno tersebut dijadikan pasal 156a dalam Kitab Undang-Undang Hukum Pidana. Lebih dari 100 orang dituntut dan diadili dengan pasal 156a, termasuk Sebastian Joe Tajir, seorang Muslim yang dihukum selama empat tahun penjara pada November 2012 di Ciamis karena komentarnya dalam Facebook mengenai keberadaan Tuhan. Ketika dia banding, putusan pengadilan tinggi Jawa Barat menyimpulkan tak ada penodaan agama namun Sebastian dihukum dengan Undang-undang Informasi dan Transaksi Elektronik soal “meresahkan masyarakat.” Hukuman penjaranya dinaikkan jadi lima tahun empat bulan. Kini Sebastian dipenjara di kota Banjar.

Pada 2009, ketika sekelompok ulama Muslim, termasuk mantan presiden Abdurrahman Wahid, mengajukan gugatan terhadap pasal 156a KUHP di Mahkamah Konstitusi, Presiden Yudhoyono menugaskan Menteri Agama Suryadharma Ali dan Menteri Hukum Patrialis Akbar mempertahankan pasal tersebut. Pada April 2010, Mahkamah Konstitusi, dengan voting 8-1, memenangkan pemerintahan Yudhoyono. Gugatan Wahid dan kawan-kawan ditolak. Mahkamah Konstitusi berpendapat negara harus melindungi enam agama –Islam, Protestan, Katholik, Hindu, Buddha dan Konghucu— dari tindakan “penodaan” karena mereka membahayakan “kerukunan beragama.”

Pada 2008, kegemaran Yudhoyono tentang “kerukunan beragama” berbuah sebuah aturan anti-Ahmadiyah, yang melarang setiap orang melakukan dakwah Ahmadiyah. Hukumannya, maksimal lima tahun penjara sesuai pasal 156a KUHP.

Peraturan tersebut membuka jalan bagi kelompok-kelompok militan macam Front Pembela Islam menyerang Ahmadiyah dengan segel masjid, pelecehan, intimidasi dan kekerasan. Contoh kekerasan terhadap Ahmadiyah terjadi pada 6 Februari 2011, ketika ratusan militan Muslim menyerang sebuah rumah Ahmadiyah dan membunuh tiga orang Ahmadiyah di Cikeusik, Banten. Polisi praktis diam saja dan menolak melindungi jemaat Ahmadiyah di Cikeusik. Di Jawa dan Sumatera sekarang setidaknya terdapat lebih dari 100 masjid Ahmadiyah yang ditutup.

Presiden Yudhoyono bukan saja gagal menghormati kebebasan beragama di Indonesia namun dia juga gagal melindungi hak-hak agama minoritas. Celakanya, pada Oktober 2012, Yudhoyono pidato di Majelis Umum PBB di New York dimana dia minta PBB bikin aturan “penodaan agama.” Yudhoyono tampaknya hendak internasionalisasi kegemarannya soal “kerukunan beragama.”

Kini warga Indonesia sedang bersiap pergi ke tempat pemungutan suara pada 9 Juli 2014 dan memilih pengganti Yudhoyono. Mereka harus menuntut agar calon presiden menjelaskan bagaimana mereka hendak mengatasi kerusakan yang telah dilakukan Yudhoyono selama satu dasawarsa.

Kegagalan dalam membatalkan warisan Yudhoyono akan memperburuk kebebasan beragama dan menciptakan lebih korban pelecehan, intimidasi dan kekerasan atas nama “kerukunan umat beragama.”

Andreas Harsono adalah peneliti hak asasi manusia dari Human Rights Watch

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Undoing Yudhoyono’s Sectarian Legacy


Ahmadiyah members prayed inside their new mosque in Balai Gana, Sintang, West Kalimantan. They had their imam hacked and moved their old mosque into the new location. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, with his presidential advisor Ma'ruf Amin, made religious minorities, including the Ahmadiyah, discriminated in Indonesia.


Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s legacy of worsening religious intolerance and related violence will be one of the biggest challenges his successor will face. Indonesia holds presidential elections on July 9.

While Yudhoyono likes to speak about Indonesia’s “religious harmony,” over the past 10 years the country’s religious minorities, including Christians, Shia, Ahmadiyah and some indigenous faiths, have become increasingly besieged by often violent Sunni Islamist militants. Yudhoyono’s response to that intolerance has been empty rhetoric and turning a blind eye to elements of his government passively or actively complicit in abuses of the rights of religious minorities.

Islamist militants have grown accustomed to attacking minorities with impunity. In certain cases, in which the security forces and prosecutors have actually intervened in such incidents, the result has frequently been the prosecution and imprisonment of representatives of the victimized minorities—not the perpetrators, with charges of “blasphemy” or “creating unrest.”

Escalation in reported cases of religious violence against minorities in Indonesia

YEAR
CASES
2007
91
2008
257
2009
181
2010
216
2011
242
2012
264
2013
220
Source: Setara Institute 

The roots of the escalation in religious intolerance and related violence began in 2005 when Yudhoyono opened the Indonesian Ulama Council congress, the umbrella organization of many Muslim groups, by announcing his intention to “take strict measures against deviant beliefs.” In March 2006 Yudhoyono’s cabinet produced a decree dedicated to “Religious Harmony, Empowering Religious Harmony Forums, and Constructing Houses of Worship.”

The decree requires Indonesia’s 33 provinces and some 500 regencies to establish so-called Religious Harmony Forums (Forum Kerukunan Umat Beragama or FKUB) as advisory bodies to governors, mayors and regents. The decree stipulates that the composition of FKUBs should “mirror the composition of religions” in each area. Consequently, the dominant religion in any given area –whether it be Muslim in western Indonesia and Christian in areas of eastern Indonesia—has the majority of members in a 17-strong FKUB (in a regency or mayoralty) or a 21-member provincial FKUB.

The decree also restricts the construction of houses of worship to the “real needs” and “composition of the population” in the area. A permit for constructing a house of worship requires:
  • List of names and ID cards of at least 90 people who will use the house of worship. This list should be endorsed by the village head;
  • Support letter from at least 60 people living in the area. This support letter should be endorsed by the village head;
  • Written recommendation from the local Ministry of Religious Affairs; and
  • Written recommendation from the local FKUB.
The result of the decree has been a legally sanctioned block on construction of new houses of worship for religious minorities in areas where Muslims are in the majority, including the islands of Java and Sumatra. In some cases, the decree has even blocked Christian congregations from renovating existing church buildings. Militant Islamists have in some areas effectively hijacked the decree and imposed vigilante-style enforcement of alleged violations. On March 21, 2013, in Bekasi, a suburb of Jakarta, the local government used an excavator vehicle to demolish the new red-brick structure of the Batak Protestant Christian Church (Huria Kristen Batak Protestan, HKBP). Officials ordered the church demolished for lack of a building permit on the demand of the Islamic People’s Forum in Taman Sari (Forum Umat Islam Taman Sari), a militant Islamist organization.

The Communion of Churches in Indonesia, a grouping of Protestant churches, has criticized the decree as more repressive than a similar regulation promulgated in 1969 during the rule of the late dictator Suharto.

Since 2005, Yudhoyono’s government has also aggressively enforced the country’s 1965 blasphemy law, an overbroad and vague legal holdover from Sukarno’s authoritarian rule. More than 100 people have been prosecuted for blasphemy since 2005 including Sebastian Joe Tajir, a Muslim sentenced to four years’ imprisonment in November 2012 for posting comments about the existence of God on his Facebook page.

When a group of Muslim scholars, including former president Abdurrahman Wahid, challenged the discriminatory nature of the blasphemy law in the Constitutional Court, Yudhoyono and his cabinet vigorously defended it. The court, in an 8-1 decision on April 19, 2010, ruled that the 1965 blasphemy law, which provides criminal penalties for those who express religious beliefs deviating from the law’s tenets of protecting six officially recognized religions, is a lawful restriction of minority religious beliefs because it allows for the maintenance of “religious harmony.”

In 2008, Yudhoyono’s concept of “religious harmony” included his government’s anti-Ahmadiyah regulation, which banned the Islamic sect from “propagating” Ahmadiyah teachings. The regulation includes a maximum five years prison term for Ahmadiyah found guilty of proselytizing.

That decree paved the way for Sunni Islamist militant groups such as the Islamic Defenders Front (Front Pembela Islam, FPI) to begin targeting Ahmadiyah and their mosques with harassment, intimidation and violence. The most egregious example of that violence occurred in February 2011, when Muslim militants killed three Ahmadiyah men in Cikeusik, western Java, in an unprovoked attack during which police on the scene refused to intervene to help the Ahmadiyah. Across Java and Sumatra there are currently more than 100 Ahmadiyah mosques shuttered at the order of local governments.

President Yudhoyono has failed to act to roll back these abuses and to protect the rights of Indonesia’s religious minorities. Instead, in October 2012 Yudhoyono devoted his speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York to call on UN member countries to adopt an international legally binding instrument to ban blasphemy against religious symbols.

As Indonesians prepare to go to the polls on July 9 to elect Yudhoyono’s successor, they should demand that their presidential candidates explain how they’ll address the damage that Yudhoyono has done to religious freedom over the past decade.

Failure to do so will only worsen religious intolerance and create new victims of harassment, intimidation and violence.

……………

Andreas Harsono is an Indonesia researcher at Human Rights Watch. You can follow him on Twitter at @AndreasHarsono.