Bill Guerin, Jakarta – Indonesia's self-appointed guardians of morality, the once disbanded radical Islamic Defenders' Front (FPI), have once again resorted to violence in the nation's capital, Jakarta.
The first attack came late Friday night when around 300 FPI storm troopers broke into the Star Deli restaurant in the elite residential and entertainment district of Kemang in South Jakarta. The restaurant had closed, after being tipped off by the police, but the FPI cadres smashed the windows and chairs. No one was injured in the attack, which, it is claimed, police did nothing to stop.
On Saturday the US Embassy issued a statement warning Americans in Indonesia to take precautions against such attacks, raising fears that the "sweeping" could affect tourism prospects. Jakarta Police quickly deployed 600 Mobile Brigade members and 500 officers to patrol the streets of the capital, with Jakarta police chief, Inspector General Firman Gani, saying the vandalism was "out of line" and definitely a violation of the law.
FPI spokesman Alawi Usman, however, was quick to defend the group's actions. "We are against immorality," he told foreign reporters the day after the Star Deli attack. "We are doing this for the future of the country's youth."
The FPI has a history of attacking places of "recreation" where they believe prostitution or gambling is taking place. In the past they have closed down brothels, burned entertainment centers and physically attacked sex workers. Their leader, Al-Habib Muhammad Rizieq bin Hussein Syihab, more popularly called Habib Rizieq, spent several months in prison last year for orchestrating attacks on "iniquitous" nightspots, bars and cafes in 2001.
Though the nightlife business rubs them up the wrong way all year round, the radicals reserve their main impetus for the fasting month of Ramadhan. Two weeks ago the FPI warned that they would once again take the law into their own hands if city officials failed to close the countless pubs, discotheques and massage parlors they deem as "sinful places".
Other Muslim groups, including the Indonesian Mujahiddin Council (MMI), Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia, the Indonesian Islamic Students Association (PII) and Indonesian Muslim Action Student Front (KAMMI), also demanded nightspots close during Ramadhan.
Though some 89% of Indonesia's 220 million people are Muslims, many do not strictly follow the tenets of Islam, preferring to combine the religion with traditional spiritual and cultural beliefs. However, Muslims are forbidden to eat, drink, smoke, and engage in sexual intercourse from sunrise until sunset during the fasting month.
Jakarta Governor Sutiyoso's response to threats by the FPI that they would, as in the past, not focus their minds on fasting but on raids on nightspots, was that such acts would only tarnish the city's image and mar the peace of Ramadhan.
Though the pleasure palaces have occasionally been ordered to close for the whole month in the past, despite complaints about loss of business, this year the Jakarta city council did what it usually does – compromise, in the wider interests of the population at large, by limiting their hours of operation for the month.
Warning that only the police or appointed government institutions had the authority to raid entertainment centers, Sutiyoso issued a decree allowing the nightspots, often frequented by foreigners, to open in the hours after the breaking of the fast and prior to the meal before sunrise.
However, alcohol can be sold and drunk, and these establishments remain open, during the rest of the year. The reasons for double standards by local administrations, in enforcing the law and upholding Islamic teachings, are not difficult to understand. The "illegal" sex business is now a major industry that directly or indirectly contributes to employment, national income and economic growth, although it remains against the law.
Authorities collect substantial revenues in areas where prostitution thrives, both illegally from bribes and corruption, but also legally from licensing fees and taxes on the many hotels, bars, restaurants and the like that flourish in its wake.
Many observers expected the FPI threat to be a hollow one this year. After all, new president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, widely expected to give a much higher priority to security issues and improve the country's image in the eyes of the international world, was inaugurated during the first week of Ramadhan, which lasts until mid-November.
Despite this, FPI paramilitary troops "visited" several restaurants and cafes across the capital and in the metropolitan districts of Tangerang, Bekasi, and Depok last week in a series of "sweeping processions". Then on Friday the first act of violence occurred when the Star Deli restaurant was attacked.
The outward face of a gentle and traditional Muslim-dominated Indonesian society has long been at odds with the stark reality that overt sexuality and drug use have exploded since the early days of the regional financial crisis.
The FPI leadership claims the organization's long-term aim is to rid the country of alcohol, drugs, gambling and prostitution and that they only attack places that blatantly operate in defiance of community standards.
Many Indonesians, however, see the movement as largely made up of preman (thugs). Critics claim that extorting money from frightened bar owners is their primary motive, rather than defending Islamic principles and cleansing society. It is also claimed that the group has been in cahoots with police and soldiers, even in competition with them, to extort protection money from owners of nightspots.
Even Pemuda Pancasila, a rival vigilante group that ran protection rackets in the Suharto days, has accused the FPI of raiding bars and clubs that do not pay sufficient protection money. In 2001 and 2002 the FPI carried out violent attacks on Jakarta's Jalan Jaksa – a street frequented by foreign backpackers and sex workers.
Claiming to defend Islam, the FPI spontaneously declared itself a "party" on August 17, 1998, during the unrest shortly after Suharto's downfall. In November of that year the group hit the streets with some 2,500 machete-wielding men to help military-backed civilian security forces secure the general session of the 1998 People's Consultative Assembly (MPR). The president at the time, BJ Habibie, was supported not only by the FPI but also by mainstream Islam, including many Islamic leaders who had supported Suharto in the last five years of his rule.
However, Juwono Sudarsono, appointed defense minister last week by president Yudhoyono, recalled later that there were elements of the police and the military intent on undermining Habibie's authority.
In any event, hundreds of students, together with pro-democracy activists, claiming the session was simply a means to legalize the Habibie leadership, marched to the parliament building to express their demands for reform.
The demonstrators kept troops tied down for hours but then dispersed to avoid the FPI. As they regrouped nearby, and while troops and police relaxed, the FPI members, wielding their machetes, marched toward the demonstrators and laid into them.
The FPI later claimed that their presence at the parliament building was to boost moral and character reforms. "If the morals and characters are not reformed then it would be useless to talk about reform in economy, political affairs, and law," FPI leader Rizieq said.
In 2002 the FPI was the largest group of demonstrators in front of the US Embassy in Jakarta when the bombing of Afghanistan began and promised to send volunteers to defend fellow Muslims against the American offensive.
Along with other radical groups Hizbut Tahrir (Party of Struggle) and the Gerakan Pemuda Islam (Islamic Youth Movement), the FPI took to the streets in March last year in a show of strength to protest against the invasion of Iraq, threatening to attack Westerners.
Prior to the Bali blasts in October 2002, which claimed more than 200 lives, the authorities appeared to turn a blind eye to the FPI's raids, lending credence to claims that the organization was backed by powerful officials in the security forces.
Though Rizieq was arrested four days after the Bali blasts, he was quickly released and placed under house arrest after the FPI announced publicly that it had decided to call it a day and refrain from "further tarnishing the image of Islam". Laskar Jihad, another, more violent Islamic militia, disbanded around the same time. In January 2003 that group's leader, Jafar Umar Thalib, was acquitted on charges of fomenting religious violence in the Maluku islands and inciting hatred of the government and then-president Megawati Sukarnoputri.
Megawati had walked a thin tightrope, trying to juggle and balance the needs of her country in terms of a secure and safe environment for investment, with the threats posed to Indonesia's vast majority of peace-loving Muslims by the radicalized few, who alleged she was siding with the Americans in adopting anti-terrorism policies.
Sudarsono, the first civilian defense minister in four decades, when serving under former president Abdurrahman Wahid from October 1999 to August 2000, is on record as saying that the Megawati government's firm stance against terrorism was being deliberately manipulated by Islamic groups to encourage its perception as being "against Islam".
Nonetheless, Megawati started to crack down on Islamic extremism, despite concerns that any move against hardline Muslims, such as Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, would be politically divisive at a time when she clearly needed support from Muslim parties if she was to win another term.
Ba'asyir, the alleged spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiyah, was arrested, tried and sentenced to four years in jail for treason. The aging cleric is now awaiting trial in connection with the Bali bombings. Several of his followers are among those convicted of involvement in those bombings, with sentences ranging from three years to death.
At the opening of his trial in May 2003, Rizieq denied any wrongdoing and defended his actions, claiming they were in line with religious and state laws. He said managers of "immoral" nightspots and the police who protect them were the ones who should be on trial. Rizieq broke the terms of his house arrest status on April 8 by leaving Indonesia. He was subsequently arrested upon his return to Jakarta on April 20. The following day his supporters helped him escape from police custody at a public prosecutor's office, but he later surrendered and was sent to jail, though claiming that his detention was the result of a conspiracy between police and the operators of illegal gambling dens.
He was sentenced to seven months behind bars for inciting public unrest and insulting the government. Released from jail in November last year, Rizieq told a crowd of cheering supporters he would continue his campaign for the imposition of Islamic law and the closure of entertainment venues deemed an affront to Islam.
Young urbanites from the lower strata of society make up the majority of FPI followers. Most are not well educated, and many are unemployed. Though the rhetoric and violence may be appealing to these Muslims, it is not winning broad support among the Muslim community. Those calling for violence and aggression in Indonesia are still preaching in a wilderness.
Even the Indonesian Ulamas Council (Majelis Ulama Indonesia or MUI), Indonesia's highest authority on Islamic matters, said in a statement on Sunday that the actions of the FPI "would tarnish the reputation of Islam".
"Leave the matter to the police," Admiral Widodo, the coordinating minister for political, legal and security affairs, said after a security meeting on Sunday. "Only the police have the authority to take legal measures" against violators of a law, he said, adding that the government was responsible for protecting both foreigners and Indonesians.
But Darmawan, leader of the Kemang community forum, has promised to take the fight to the streets. Kemang is home to hundreds of foreign businessmen and wealthy Indonesians, including those who operate businesses and are not necessary Muslims. "We don't want this neighborhood, where we make our livings, to be destroyed. We will defend it with all our might," Darmawan was quoted as saying.
FPI commander Jafar Sidiq, however, was not impressed, warning that the raids would continue, since "the authority is lax in its supervision".
[Bill Guerin has worked for 19 years in Indonesia as a journalist and editor. He specializes in business/economy issues and political analysis related to Indonesia. He has been a Jakarta correspondent for Asia Times Online since 2000 and has also been published by the BBC on East Timor.]