Muhammadiyah avoids movement backing Ahmadiyah dissolution

Muhammadiyah avoids movement backing Ahmadiyah dissolution


Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Muhammadiyah Chairman Din Syamsuddin said his organization would not involve in any movement supporting the dissolution of Ahmadiyah religious sect.

Instead, Muhammadiyah, Indonesia`s second biggest Islamic organization after Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), would do its best to prevent Muslims from being misled by Ahmadiyah followers, he said.

"It is the state`s power to take stern action by referring to our Constitution because the existence of a group in society is the state`s business," he said here Monday.

Speaking to newsmen in response to the unresolved Ahmadiyah matter, Din Syamsuddin said Muhammadiyah`s stance on this deviant sect had never changed since the issuance of a "fatwa" in 1933.

According to the "fatwa" that Muhammadiyah issued in 1933 or much earlier than those of Rabithan Alam Islami in 1979 and Indonesian Council of Ulemas (MUI) in 2005, Ahmadiyah was "misleading", he said.

In response to the recent incident of sectarian violence in Banten province, he said the government tended to submit that to the people rather than take firm legal action.

Despite the fact that the government had a reason for not intervening into its people`s religious problems, it should take stern actions against those involving in violence, he said.

On February 18, a number of Islamic organizations and Indonesian Council of Ulema (MUI) in Banten had asked the government to soon ban the Ahmadiyah sect in the province.

"Before the Cikeusik incident occurred on February 6, MUI had actually urged the provincial government to ban all activities of the Ahmadiyah sect," MUI-Banten chapter`s chairman KH Aminudin Ibrahim said.

MUI, Nahdlatul Ulama, Muhammadiyah, and Religious Followers` Harmony Forum (FKUB) in Banten Province had agreed to again call on the provincial government to ban all activities of Ahmadiyah,he said.

The ban could be imposed through a Banten governor`s or provincial government regulation, Ibrahim said.

A series of attacks on Ahmadiyah religious sect followers and their properties have occurred in some parts of Indonesia over the past two years.

The latest incident happened in Umbulan village Cikeusik subdistrict, Pandeglang district, Banten province, on February 6, killing three people.

In response to the latest incident, Former Vice President Jusuf Kalla said the cases of sectarian violence could be handled if firm law enforcement was implemented to the doers.

"Don`t let the perpetrators be untouched by the law. If it is so, there will be a feeling that if we kill or destroy properties in a mass, we think that the law cannot do anything," he said. (*)

Editor: B Kunto Wibisono