There have been far too many stories about the construction of new houses of worship being built in Muslim-majority Indonesia, but they rarely involve the construction of new mosques. However, news that a mosque that espouses the ultraconservative Wahhabi doctrine of Islam was being built in Jakarta’s satellite city of Bogor has led to massive protests by locals and the freezing of the mosque’s building permit by Bogor’s mayor.
The building permit (IMB) for the construction of the Ahmad bin Hanbal Mosque was issued in September of last year, but news of its imminent construction led to several hundred local protesters clashing with the mosque’s supporters at the building’s construction site on August 7.
A 37-year-old resident of the neighborhood, Maman, told the media that the construction of a Wahabi mosque could divide the local Muslim community. He said that plans for the mosque had already been rejected by the community when first proposed in 2015 but, despite that, the government still ended up giving them an IMB and construction had started.
“The people here who were at first quiet became annoyed with the new congregation. We were disturbed. That’s the point,” Maman said as quoted by Merdeka.
Tengku Muhammad Ali, a member of the Ahmad bin Hanbal Mosque’s governing board, told the media that they had followed all the proper government regulations and that he suspected most of the protesters had been brought in from outside the local community.
Controversy over the mosque continued to grow and another protest to reject its construction took place yesterday morning, with around 1,000 people estimated to have taken part.
Representatives of the protesters met with Bogor Mayor Bima Arya Sugiarto, who finally decided to freeze the mosque’s IMB in response to the protests.
“The reasons for the freeze are two, namely technical and social reasons. I am instructing the Licensing Office to study these two things, if technically there is a problem or if it is causing social turmoil that divides the people, it can be suspended,” Bima said after meeting with the protest representatives as quoted by Republika.
The Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) of Bogor said before yesterday’s protest that they did not approve of the demonstration because it would only worsen the situation. Senior MUI Bogor official Ustadz Wardhani said that the issue of Wahabi was being used by the enemies of Islam to provoke its followers to turn against one another.
