A leader for Muhammadiyah's global opportunities

Ridho Al-Hamdi
The Jakarta Post

Makassar   /   Wed, August 5, 2015   /  06:06 am

The nation'€™s second-largest modernist Muslim organization, Muhammadiyah, is from Aug. 3 to 7 holding its first post-centennial national congress since its establishment in 1912. With significant roles in improving health and economic empowerment in the country, in its second century Muhammadiyah should increase its role at the international level.

In April this year a study by the Pew Research Center reported that Islam was projected to have the fastest growth of all religions from 2010 to 2050, when it would be the world'€™s second-largest religion with almost 30 percent of the world'€™s population or 2.76 billion followers.

Meanwhile, by 2050 Christians would have an estimated 31.4 percent of the world'€™s population with 2.92 billion devotees.

Nevertheless, Islamic extremism is a growing global trend, as seen by the spread of the Islamic State (IS) movement in Iraq and Syria and Boko Haram in Nigeria. Unresolved political tensions in the Middle East and North Africa show that the future of democracy in Muslim countries is unlikely to be stable in the years ahead.

This strengthens perceptions in the West that Islam and Muslims are not encouraging democracy.

Since 2005, Muhammadiyah has been led by the scholar Din Syamsuddin for two periods until 2015 and thus the congress will choose a new leader for the next five years. Din'€™s legacy includes first, the success of internationalization of Muhammadiyah'€™s religious propagation.

Second, its boldness in criticizing the government and evaluating its unfair policies.

Third, its capability to become a mediator in various conflicts of both national and international levels.

Fourth is the success in regeneration in its internal networks.

Fifth is the focus of the three pillars of Muhammadiyah in its second century: disaster management, philanthropy and economic empowerment.

A number of problems nonetheless have to be evaluated. First, the weakness of ideological commitment and organizational discipline.

Second, the weakness of Muhammadiyah movements at the grassroots levels.

Third, the lack of integration among its institutions, such as among its schools, universities and hospitals. These three problems have led to infiltrations among Muhammadiyah adherents. For instance, extremism, which encourages violence in the form of suicide bombs and terrorism on behalf of jihad.

Thus Muhammadiyah must focus on two main policies: strengthening internal networks and expanding the dakwah or propagation mission on the international level. In networking Muhammadiyah should concentrate on three agendas. First is the improvement of religious or Koran reading classes with references to the Koran and the Prophet'€™s sayings or hadith, which many devotees seem to have neglected.

Second is the commitment of Muhammadiyah'€™s elites to improving the organization from the national level to the grassroots. Third is the courage of its leaders to execute organizational discipline and to counter all sort of extremist values.

Meanwhile, expanding the dakwah should include providing scholarships for Muhammadiyah'€™s activists and lecturers to study abroad.

Second is establishing special Muhammadiyah branches in numerous countries because of its abundant human resources overseas.

Third is the arrangement of dakwah tours to foreign countries during every Ramadhan.

Fourth is empowering Indonesian migrant workers, particularly in countries and regions with large numbers of these migrants such as Malaysia, Japan, China, South Korea, Taiwan, the Middle East and North Africa.

Fifth is the organization of international youth leadership exchanges.

Muhammadiyah definitely has been addressing distinctive past, present and future challenges. The three last leaders revealed different features as seen from Amien Rais, Syafi'€™i Ma'€™arif and Din Syamsuddin. Nonetheless, today'€™s national and global developments leads to certain characteristics needed by the new leader of Muhammadiyah.

First, the leader should have an international vision, to disseminate Islam'€™s peaceful teachings amid extremist movements. Second, the leader should be an intellectual ulema with sophisticated religious knowledge.

As one of the most influential Muslim organizations, Muhammadiyah needs a leader who can present the substance of Islam and provide enlightenment to social problems.

Third, the leader should have strong capability in organizational management. Muhammadiyah today has more than 12,000 village boards and nearly 4,000 sub-district boards, as well as abundant human and natural resources in education, health, the economy and community empowerment across the country. All these assets require a leader competent to overcome the various differences among them.

Fourth, the leader must have the ability to interpret the teachings of the founder, Ahmad Dahlan, to cope with challenges in Muhammadiyah'€™s second century.

The notion of Islam berkemajuan (loosely: progressive Islam) has to be contextualized precisely in current circumstances.

The future of Muhammadiyah depends on its community or ummah '€” thus congress participants have the responsibility to evaluate and create the policy, agenda and strategy of the organization.
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The writer chairs the Muhammadiyah special branch of Germany and is researching political parties and good governance for his Phd in political science at the Technical University of Dortmund, Germany.

https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2015/08/05/a-leader-muhammadiyah-s-global-opportunities.html

New chairman wants to protect minorities

• Haeril Halim, Andi Hajramurni The Jakarta Post
  

Makassar   /   Fri, August 7, 2015   /  04:26 pm

New leader: Muhammadiyah’s newly elected chairman, Haedar Nashir, (center) poses with other executives of the organization in Makassar on Thursday. Haedar will hold the position of chairman until 2020.(Antara/Yusran Uccang) (center) poses with other executives of the organization in Makassar on Thursday. Haedar will hold the position of chairman until 2020.(Antara/Yusran Uccang)

New leader: Muhammadiyah'€™s newly elected chairman, Haedar Nashir, (center) poses with other executives of the organization in Makassar on Thursday. Haedar will hold the position of chairman until 2020.(Antara/Yusran Uccang)
A calm and laid-back plenary session at the Muhammadiyah muktamar (national congress) in Makassar, South Sulawesi, endorsed on Thursday sociology professor Haedar Nashir as chairman of the organization for the 2015-2020 term, replacing outgoing leader Din Syamsuddin.

The election of the 57-year-old scholar raised hope that the organization would maintain its stance on protecting beleaguered minority groups, including Shiite and Ahmadiyah, given his track records as a figurehead of the organization'€™s moderate faction.

Haedar, whose wife Siti Noordjannah Djohantini was also elected as the chairperson of Muhammadiyah'€™s women'€™s auxiliary, Aisyiyah, assumed the top position after all 13 newly elected members of the Muhammadiyah board of leadership unanimously agreed to name him the next chairman.

Shortly after his election, Haedar delivered a speech in which he vowed that under his leadership Muhammadiyah would continue giving protection to all minority groups in Indonesia regardless of their faiths and cultural backgrounds as part of the organization'€™s efforts to bring harmonious relations to this multicultural country.

'€œMuhammadiyah has the solution that the majority should protect the minority and at the same time the minority should build a synergy with the majority. We will try to prevent conflicts or mediate any developing conflict. We must protect the minority,'€ Haedar said in his speech at the venue of the national congress at Makassar Muhammadiyah University, in Makassar on Thursday night.

In his speech Haedar also congratulated Nadhlatul Ulama (NU) for electing its new chairman during its muktamar in Jombang, East Java, on Wednesday.

Haedar vowed to further improve cooperation with NU through a number of strategic partnership programs, including campaigns to protect minority groups in Indonesia.

Haedar also pledged that Muhammadiyah would continue to stay neutral in the country'€™s politics.

'€œMuhammadiyah will stick to its stance of not having an alignment with political parties in the country and will not establish any political party in the future. As an independent organization Muhammadiyah will maintain communications with all political parties,'€ Haedar said.

Meanwhile, Muhammadiyah'€™s new secretary-general, Abdul Mu'€™ti, said that Haedar was elected in a unanimous decision.

'€œIt only took the board of leadership 10 minutes to make its decision on the chairmanship and secretary-generalship.'€

Haedar topped the list of preferences of the 13 new Muhammadiyah board of leadership members polled on Wednesday after 1,974 out of 2,389 congress participants voted for him to sit on the board. Mu'€™ti came in fourth place with 1,802 votes.

A political analyst from the State Islamic University (UIN), Syarif Hidayatullah Fuad Fanani, said that Haedar and Mu'€™ti, whom he considered moderates, were the perfect pair to lead Muhammadiyah.

'€œPak Haedar is good at internal bureaucratic reform to deal with internal affairs in Muhammadiyah, while Pak Mu'€™ti is a good at international relations,'€ Fuad told The Jakarta Post.

Meanwhile, Muhammadiyah observer Kim Hyung-jun from Seoul National University said that he believed Haedar and Mu'€™ti would keep their promise to protect minority groups in Indonesia. '€œThey are both moderate figures,'€ Kim said.

In a separate election, Haedar'€™s wife Siti was reelected as Aishiyah chairperson after being elected earlier to the women'€™s organization'€™s board of leadership during its congress in Jakarta.

Header and his wife repeated the feat achieved by Muhammadiyah'€™s founder, Islamic cleric Ahmad Dahlan, in 1912 when he was elected to lead Muhammadiyah, while his wife assumed the top post of Aisyiyah.

https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2015/08/07/new-chairman-wants-protect-minorities.html

Is Indonesian Islam too big to fail?

Syafiq Hasyim
Director of the International Center for Islam and Pluralism in Jakarta

Jakarta   /   Fri, June 9, 2017   /  11:44 am

This aerial view shows Indonesian Muslims gathering at Jakarta's National Monument Park as part of a rally against Jakarta's Christian Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, better known by his nickname Ahok, on December 2, 2016. More than 100,000 Indonesian Muslims protested on December 2 against Jakarta's Christian governor, the second major demonstration in a matter of weeks as conservative groups push for his arrest on accusations of insulting Islam. (AFP/File)

The above question is addressed to those who still believe in the strength of Indonesian Islam post-Jakarta gubernatorial election and the verdict of two years’ imprisonment handed down to Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama, the outgoing Jakarta governor.

Indonesian Islam refers to Islam that is progressive, moderate and respectful of the diversity of ethnicities, beliefs and cultures that support democracy in the country.

For many years, local and international observers have felt confident about the authority of Indonesian Islam. The mushrooming of Islamic conservatism and radicalism has not been considered threatening enough to shrink the dominance of moderate and inclusive Islam.

The dominant role of the largest Islamic organizations, Nahdathul Ulama (NU) and Muhammadiyah, in Muslim communities is often used as reason for this optimism. Is this thesis still valid?

Indonesian Islam has been socially and politically attempted and strived for by those who believe in compatibility between Islam and democracy.

However, many elements of Indonesian Islam are too self-confident about the long supremacy of Indonesian Islam.

The source of this conviction is often the history of Islam’s entry to this country. It is often said Islam in Indonesia is different from Islam in the Middle East owing to its historical process, which was not through war and bloodshed but through peaceful penetration.

Thus, many of us take for granted and feel satisfied that the progressive and moderate characteristics of Indonesian Islam would never be defeated by the different version of Islam in this country.

Such historical evidence is very important, however not enough to maintain and sustain Indonesian Islam. It is questionable and to some extent no longer relevant.

Now, Indonesian Islam has begun to lose ground on account of an aggressive counter from “the different version of Islam” — stemming from the tendency of especially urban folks demanding an Islam that is more ideological, formalistic and operational in politics. More Indonesian Muslims want Islam as their main identity in politics, culture and lifestyle.

This tendency had been detected long before the 2017 Jakarta gubernatorial election, although many of us apparently ignored it. Many attempts at “sharia-zation” (inclusion of sharia in the legal, political and public sphere) has run systematically and strategically since the Reform Era.

When attempts aimed to make Indonesia a sharia-based state failed in 2002, the strategy of the sharia movement turned into a cultural movement, by conditioning Indonesian Muslims to embrace more sharia-inspired lifestyles such as halal economics and consumption.

Indonesia now has the 2014 law on halal product assurance as well as the 2008 law on sharia banking.

The halal and sharia economic movement is a step further toward the establishment of sharia as the legal and political system. Its propagators use a direct connection strategy to the grass roots, including through social media.

Its messages stimulate emotions of being Muslim, including the social gap and injustice experienced by many Muslims.

At a different level, the propagators of Indonesian Islam are not really aware of and to some extent dismiss this new environment and contestation in coining the meaning of Islam. Such “progressive” Muslims seem to be ignorant and overconfident.

The NU and Muhammadiyah, which are expected to be bastions of moderate Indonesian Islam, have been too busy bargaining for power in the government, and care less for their communities.

In addition, both organizations rely heavily on the state for being the guardians of sustainability of democracy and benign Islam.

Sometimes, the NU is very critical of the antidemocratic movement, but theirs are often lone voices. In short, the consolidation of Indonesian Islam tends to indicate their failure.

Interestingly, those who need “more formalistic, ideological and political Islam” are intensively mingled with populist issues. They have shown adequate flexibility to blend their campaigns with issues of social and economic injustice.

Although religious sentiment remains very important for their movement, the groups have indicated their ability to consolidate networks and to gain a stronger grip on the Muslim grass roots.

Combining populism with identity based politics has been very successful, as indicated by two results; first, the loss of Ahok-Djarot Saiful Hidayat in the recent Jakarta election and second, their pressure on Ahok’s trial that resulted in a two-year sentence for blasphemy.

What should be done by Indonesian Islam to overcome this circumstance?

Indonesian Islam should not mimic the strategy used by those who believe in Islamic formalism, ideology and politics.

For instance, using populism as the tagline of its struggle would lead to tyranny by the majority. Indonesian Islam instead aims for reduced segregation between the majority and minority.

Indonesian Islam should not use identity politics because doing so could lead to discrimination. Unfortunately, reflecting on the recent Jakarta gubernatorial election, today’s Indonesian Muslims in general seem to love both populism and identity politics.

In fact, Ahok’s case has stimulated the sentiment of Islamic populism and identity politics. Indonesian Muslims who have been recognized as open and tolerant are becoming more ethnic and religion-oriented.

If Indonesian Islam does not want to fail in mainstreaming its religious discourse, it must find ideas and idioms that can regain cleverly and responsibly the support of Indonesian Muslims.

If not, the notion that Indonesian Islam is too big to fail is just a claim.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post.

https://www.thejakartapost.com/academia/2017/06/09/is-indonesian-islam-too-big-to-fail.html