A North Sumatra woman named Meiliana has become the latest example of perceived injustice from the application of Indonesia’s controversial blasphemy law. Meiliana, a 44-year-old Buddhist of Chinese descent, was sentenced on Tuesday to 18 months in prison for complaining about the volume of the mosque loudspeakers in her neighborhood in 2016, which led to mass rioting and destruction of several Buddhist temples in retaliation by local Muslims.
Her conviction received condemnation from religious and government officials alike, and netizens have also come out in force to say that her prison sentence was an extreme injustice. On Twitter, the topic “Bebaskan Meiliana” (Free Meiliana) has become among the top trending topics on the social media platform today with most tweets saying Meliana’s conviction is another huge fail for tolerance in Indonesia.
Bebaskan Meiliana jangaan biarkan Intoleransi berkembangbiak musnahkan segera kami kaum minoritas bukan υπ†υk dinjak injak dantdk takut
— cristhy (@Tjie22Christy) August 23, 2018
Free Meiliana, don’t let intolerance spread, destroy it immediately. We the minority are not to be trampled on and we are not scared.
https://twitter.com/permadiaktivis/status/1032472306595942400
If everyone is jailed for asking to lower the call to prayer’s volume then everybody who lowers the call to prayer volume on their TV must be jailed as well. Free Meiliana.
https://twitter.com/adtaufiq/status/1032454485434454016
All Indonesian citizens have the same rights, so where is justice when it’s based on “in the name of the majority”? Free Meiliana, uphold tolerance!
A petition was also created on Change.org urging President Joko Widodo to pay special attention to Meiliana’s case and possibly pardon her as well. Close to 40,000 people have signed the online petition at the time of writing, less than 24 hours after it was created.
Indonesia’s controversial blasphemy laws have been under intense scrutiny in the past few years, particularly after the jailing of former Jakarta Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama in 2017 for blasphemy against Islam. Many domestically and abroad, including the United Nations, have called for abolishment of the laws as they are prone to political manipulation and have been used to overwhelming to persecute religious minorities.
