Richel Langit, Jakarta – Dozens of people suspected of plotting the deadly Bali bombing have been arrested, and the head of the joint international team investigating the terrorist attack, Inspector General I Made Mangku Pastika, has been declared the Asian Newsmaker of the Year by the US magazine Time, but the terrorist network operating in the world's largest archipelagic country is far from being rooted out.
If anything, the ongoing investigation into the Bali attack and the subsequent arrests of suspects reveal that those terrorists have established such an extensive network that is much bigger than the government and the public at large had thought. Since the first suspect, Amrozi, was arrested in early November, new suspects have kept popping up. To date, at least 15 suspects have been apprehended and 10 others are still at large but still there is no sign that the terrorist network connected with the Bali bombings that killed nearly 200 people and wounded more than 300 on October 12 has been fully busted.
In her year-end speech, President Megawati Sukarnoputri vowed to root out the terrorist network in the country but, given how extensive it is, one wonders whether her government has the ability and resources to track down and crush those terrorist groups.
Much of the difficulty stems from the fact that Muslim hardliners have successfully stirred the country's anti-terrorism drive as a campaign dictated by foreign countries, especially the United States and her allies, to destroy Islam. This is clearly demonstrated by defense lawyers who insist on calling themselves the Muslim Defense Team, known as Tim Pembela Muslim or TPM, despite calls by some moderate Muslim groups that they get rid of the Muslim tag.
Their insistence on using the Muslim tag does not only rally Muslim groups behind suspected terrorists but also undermines efforts by moderate Muslim groups – notably the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) and Muhammadiyah – to rid Islam of the terrorist image. NU and Muhammadiyah are the country's biggest Muslim organizations, with a combined membership of about 70 million, or almost one-third of the country's population of 215 million people, 85 percent of which are Muslims.
Leaders of the two biggest Muslim organizations, together with Catholic, Protestant, Hindu and Buddhist leaders, have been campaigning against associating terrorism with certain religious groups such as Islam. They emphasize that the involvement of certain Muslim leaders in terrorist acts has nothing to do with religion even if these criminals claim to have done their deeds to advance the interests of Islam.
One of the principal suspects in the Bali bombing, Abdul Azis, alias Imam Samudra, was able to travel safely to his home town in Serang, Banten, and escape arrest for more than a month because some religious leaders in East Java and Banten provinces gave him protection. Ali Gufron, alias Muklas, the elder brother and alleged leader of the Asia terrorist network Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), also enjoyed certain protection. The United Nations included JI on its list of terrorist groups in November.
During a re-enactment of their final preparation meeting in Mojokerto, East Java, last month, many onlookers cheered Ali Gufron, Amrozi, Abdul Azis and other suspects. Some even shouted "I love you" to the handcuffed suspects. In Bandung, the capital of West Java province, T-shirts bearing the face of Imam Samudra and replicas of the T-shirt he wore when he appeared before the public for the first time after his arrest are in great demand.
The cheers and T-shirts demonstrate how the alleged terrorists, condemned by leaders of all religions in Indonesia, including Islam, and by the international community, have won admiration, or perhaps support, from some young Indonesians who may pick up the struggle if these suspected terrorists are put behind bars or are no longer around.
In Makassar, the capital of South Sulawesi province, where three people were killed and 11 others injured in a bomb blast on December 5, local religious leaders told police investigators not to arrest leaders of a local Muslim militia group called Laskar Jundullah, strongly suspected of being behind the bombing, to avoid possible religious conflicts. Some leaders of Laskar Jundullah are also local leaders of NU and Muhammadiyah. Laskar Jundullah is headed by Agus Dwikarna, who is currently jailed in Manila for illegal possession of explosives.
The Indonesian government's decision not to engage moderate Muslim groups in the country's campaign against terrorism may have also reinforced suspicion that the war was directed against Islam. Leaders of both NU and Muhammadiyah have thrown their support behind the government's anti-terrorism drive but their offer to help the government fight terrorism has been widely ignored by President Megawati.
NU and Muhammadiyah leaders, for example, have complained that their request to meet with Megawati to discuss ways they could help the government fight terrorism have not been granted. The participation of these two Muslim groups in fighting terrorism would have offset efforts by radical groups to rally Muslim communities behind suspected terrorists and help distance Islam from terrorism. Their campaign against identifying terrorism with Islam would have helped the government crack down on terrorist networks operating in Indonesia without fears of retaliation from Muslim groups.
But Megawati, whose leadership has come under constant scrutiny by radical Muslim groups simply because she is a woman, chose to go it alone. It is hard to fathom why the government has taken this path. It is true that fighting against terrorism is the sole responsibility of the government but, given the fact that terrorism has been identified with Islam, the involvement of those two Muslim groups in the government's anti-terrorism drive is the only recipe for success.