RELIGION-INDONESIA: Killings of Islamic Teachers Spread Fear

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Kafil Yamin

JAKARTA, Nov 2 1998 (IPS) - Khai Haji Nu’man was absorbed in prayer when two men barged into his house. “You’re a sorcerer. We’ve been watching you for long. You deserve death,” one of them threatened him. “We’ll come again and get you.”

The two then disappeared. Nu’man was among six Koranic teachers in West Java, on Indonesia’s main island, who experienced such terror on the night of Oct 23.

That same night, two men stormed into an Islamic boarding school in Cileunyi, West Java, and demanded to know the students about the whereabouts of the khai, or the Muslim community leader. Finding him, the two accused the boarding school head of being a sorcerer and threatened to burn down the school compound.

The teacher and his students were not killed, but probably only because the perpetrators thought that threats were enough.

So far, police say more than 140 people in the deeply religious eastern end of Java island, most of them Koranic teachers or ‘ustadz’, have been killed in 11 regencies. The Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence puts the total of 157.

The mysterious killing spree started two months ago in Banyuwangi, when several “black magic practitioners” were found dead.

Reports of killings of people believed to be black magicians and sorcerers — who the rural folk fear for their spells — have been heard of before especially when they are suspected to have killed innocent people.

But the current spate of attacks has fueled widespread fear because they appear to be organised, and are targetting not just black magicians but respected Koranic teachers and Muslim boarding schools.

The authorities have not been able to stop the violent and gruesome killings, although the military last week to put a halt to the murders this month.

Witnesses said that the perpetrators usually wore dark-colored coats and masks when conducting the killings, and dubbed them ‘ninja killers’.

“It is true that occasionally we lynch sorcerers. We do it together. But these killings is very professional in nature. They (killers) are well-trained and well-organised. Besides, we just cannot recognise them,” Ali Wijaya, a resident of Banyuwangi, told IPS.

In a very short time, the killing spree spread to neighbouring regencies like Jember, Pasuruan, Malang, Surabaya, reaching West Java province from the east.

Conspiracy theories have spread as fast as news of the killings, which remain unexplained and are covered closely by the local press.

One theory, aired by the military, goes that the murders were perpetrated by descendants of members of the outlawed Indonesian Communist Party who were killed in large numbers in the purge in the wake of the 1965 coup blamed on the communists.

At the time, the military was believed to have colluded with Islamic leaders in the murder of thousands suspected to be communist sympathisers.

“They are taking revenge for their parents’ killings and they feel it is time,” said national police chief Lt Gen Roesmanhadi, indicating that the communists’ kin felt they could exact retribution now that Suharto, who had come to power in the wake of 1965 coup, was gone.

But influential Islamic leaders dispute this. To the surprise of many, Abdurrahman Wahid, chair of the largest Muslim organisation Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), alleged that Cabinet ministers and “non-structural officers” were behind the murders.

“It is obvious that the masterminds are everywhere, both in the Cabinet and outside the formal political structure,” he told a group of government critics recently.

A good number of the Islamic teachers killed in the recent murders belonged to the NU, and East Java is a stronghold of NU, which has some 30 million members.

Wahid believes the killings are meant to split Indonesia’s major Islamic groups. The murders aim to “to paralyse NU” and “to trigger civil war” between NU and Muhammadiyah, the country’s second largest Muslim group previously headed by pro- reform figure Amien Rais.

Thus far, NU leaders are not happy with how authorities are dealing with the killings and threaten to take justice into their own hands.

A thousand-strong NU task force has now been deployed to guard Muslim preachers in Surabaya, East Java and surrounding areas. But this group’s vigilance has already begun to be excessive, leading to violent deaths of suspected ‘ninjas’.

Four men, suspected to be killers of Islamic teachers, were recently killed in two separate attacks by NU members and their fellow villagers.

Three were mobbed to death after the task force members found traditional Madurese daggers in their cars and suspected them to be among the killers. Outnumbered, the police came too late.

Rais, chairman of the newly-established National Mandate Party believes that the killings are part of a political game. “If we judge the magnitude and the slow response of security officers, it seems that this (murder spree) is not a pure crime,” he said.

Fearing more violence, hundreds of residents of Banyuwangi from the eastern end of Java have fled their homes and sought refuge to places like Bali, Lumajang, Surabaya and Malang.

“We let them go rather than see them murdered,” said Banyuwangi regent T. Purnomo Sidik. “For the time being, that is the only way to save them.”

Other activists suspect military involvement in the killings, which have raised questions about law and order and the government’s ability to keep the peace.

Some suggest that members of the well-trained Special Forces, Kopassus, wanted to send a message to critics that the military’s dual function as a political and security force remains necessary.

“When the situation come to worse, people will come to the military and ask them for help, to which they (the military) will reply, ‘So you need us to deal with your business. Then why are you against our social and political role?’,” an analyst said.