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Numerous people claim Instagram erased their photos with FPI leader Rizieq Shihab

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Coconuts Jakarta - April 10, 2019

Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) leader Rizieq Shihab is not welcome on Instagram, at least according to his supporters, as several of them have publicly claimed that the social media platform is erasing their photos of the controversial hardline cleric.

The latest claim was made by an Instagram user, who goes by the pseudonym Anto, who says Instagram deleted his post for containing an image of Rizieq.

Speaking to CNN Indonesia, Anto said he attended presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto's campaign rally at the Gelora Bung Karno (GBK) Stadium in Jakarta on Sunday. At around 1 pm that day, he posted a photo he took of a large FPI flag featuring a large print of Rizieq's face on Instagram story.

"At around 2 pm, I received a notification that one of my photos violated community guidelines," Anto said. He later realized that his Rizieq flag photo was removed from his feed.

Anto then posted two more variations of the same photo. He said one of them was later removed for violating Instagram's terms of use, while the other remained.

Before Anto, several other Rizieq supporters have claimed that their photos with Rizieq were erased by Instagram within the past couple of months.

Among them were two celebrities, Pipik Dian Irawati, widow of the deceased celebrity cleric Jefry Al Buchory, and former Persija soccer club player Gunawan Dwi Cahyo, who claimed that Instagram removed their photos with Rizieq when they went to visit Rizieq in Saudi Arabia respectively.

Instagram yesterday responded to the allegations, though probably not in a way that would appease those that claim the social media platform has an anti-Rizieq bias.

"Instagram is open to discussions about a variety of topics and values, as well as committed to raise awareness about important issues to the public. But we will remove any content that violate our established community guidelines," an Instagram spokesperson told CNN Indonesia yesterday, without explaining if or why the photos of Rizieq had been removed.

FPI says they have never been satisfied with any explanation by Instagram or its parent company Facebook regarding content removal, but this time the hardline group is pointing the finger at another party.

"Based on our research, FPI received info that the policy was enacted at the request of a government ministry responsible for [IT] matters," FPI Secretary General Munarman said, without offering any evidence to support the claim.

Rizieq is currently in self-imposed exile in Saudi Arabia, where he has been since April 2017 after he fled Indonesia to escape police investigation into a controversial pornography allegation.

This is not the first time that FPI, which Rizieq founded, as well as affiliated hardline Islamic groups have accused Facebook (and by extension, Instagram) of unfairly silencing their movement.

In late 2017, FPI and their sympathizers boycotted Facebook for 24 hours for banning groups and pages related to FPI (we're not sure why they didn't do so permanently if Facebook is not friendly towards them) and called on Muslims to create an alternative social media network that is "friendly" to all religions. None have rivaled Facebook since.

Source: https://coconuts.co/jakarta/news/persona-non-gram-ta-numerous-people-claim-instagram-erased-photos-fpi-leader-rizieq-shihab/

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