Anita Rachman & Elisabeth Oktofani

Elisabeth Oktofani & Farouk Arnaz

The lenient sentences handed down to the killers of three Ahmadiyah followers were the result of “manipulated” legal proceedings, which began when police launched their preliminary investigation, a human rights group said on Monday.

Police limited the scope of the investigation and distracted the core issue to the point that Ahmadiyah members were blamed for the Feb. 6 attack, when they should have been recognized as victims, the Setara Institute for Peace and Democracy said.

“Instead of providing justice for the victims and getting the facts surrounding the incident, police constructed a story in which Ahmadiyah followers provoked the mob to attack them,” said Ismail Hasani, a researcher at the institute.

Police were too busy to defending their reputation, he said, to launch a fair and professional probe into the case.

Ismail said that during the incident in Cikeusik, Banten, officers were present at the scene but said they couldn’t control the mob or prevent them from assaulting the members of the minority Islamic sect. In order to avoid accusations of criminal negligence, he continued, police argued they had asked the Ahmadis to flee but the call was ignored.

From that point on, right up to the point the court verdicts were read, the Ahmadis were blamed for the attack, Ismail said.

Police arrested and charged 12 suspects in relation to the attack. Despite facing sentences of up to 12 years in jail, prosecutors recommended prison sentences of between five and seven months for the defendants.

On the other hand, prosecutors recommended nine months in jail for Deden Sujana, the head of security for the Indonesian Ahmadiyah Congregation (JAI), for allegedly provoking the attack.

The Serang District Court sentenced the attackers to between three and six months in jail, with the judge saying repeatedly that the Ahmadiyah members triggered the violence.

“We cannot blame the judicial system itself for the result because it might have been manipulated by the law enforcers, from the police to the prosecutors and the judge,” Ismail said.

Bonar Tigor Naipospos, Setara’s deputy chairman, said sectarian conflict would soon become a daily occurrence unless the government took serious measures against extremism.

“The main problem here is that there is no significant regulation to deal with the perpetrators of sectarian conflicts, especially if the perpetrators are coming from an Islamic group led by influential clerics,” Bonar said. “In such cases, law enforcement officials are hesitant to take serious action.”

According to the group, there were 99 sectarian conflicts or attacks in 13 provinces during the first half of the year. West Java experienced the most clashes, with 30 incidents.

“There were three major attacks in February, including in Cikeusik, Temanggung [Central Java] and Pasuruan [East Java],” Ismail said.

A violent mob burned down three churches in Temanggung, demanding that a Christian man be sentenced to death for insulting Islam. Also in February, hundreds of people set on the Yapi pesantren, or Islamic boarding school, which was accused of spreading Shiite teachings, injuring four students.

“Those three major clashes in February actually triggered more attacks in March and April,” he said. “Our reports show there were 24 incidents of religious violence in March and another 24 in April.”

Most of the incidents involved destruction of places of worship, accusations of apostasy, discriminatory regulations toward minority religions and forced conversions, particularly of Ahmadiyah members, the group said.

In March, 33 Ahmadiyah members living in Bogor decided to convert to mainstream Islam, following the wave of attacks and intimidation against sect members.

A human rights group on Sunday questioned whether the government had been “too cautious” in dealing with conflict in Papua, adding that it placed too much blame on the separatist Free Papua Organization.

“We are really concerned that the government is losing the political commitment to promote dialogue between the central government and Papua,” said Haris Azhar, chairman of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras).

“Is [the government] simply too cautious about the Papua problem or is it too afraid to confront powerful groups in Papua, which might have a special agenda?”

Kontras said it recorded at least eight violent clashes in Papua since the start of July, claiming the lives of 25 civilians and three Indonesian soldiers, and injuring scores more people.

The intensified clashes occurred soon after hundreds of indigenous Papuans attended peace talks from July 5 to 7, at which Djoko Suyanto, coordinating minister for political, legal and security affairs, was a key speaker.

Haris said the government was using separatism as an excuse to take repressive measures, even after it had stated that it would not deploy more soldiers to the area.

This was counterproductive, Kontras activist Chrisbiantoro said, as not only had the recent conflicts claimed more victims, but they covered a wider area and had more root causes.

“This situation is getting worse because the government blames the Free Papua Organization [OPM], but there has been no investigation of OPM’s role in the conflict,” he said. “And they support the presence of the military to solve the situation.”

Chrisbiantoro said the government needed to learn from its experience in Poso, Central Sulawesi, an area racked by sectarian conflict in the early reform era. Separatism accusations made by Jakarta only worsened the situation, he said.

Kontras said the central government needed to adopt three main policies to prevent the conflict deteriorating: it should stop making provocative statements, allow only the president or the chief security minister to speak on the issue and abandon all repressive policies.

Chrisbiantoro said the government should not panic about a legal motion in London seeking a referendum on independence for the West Papuan people.

“There are many developed countries with economic interests in Papua that would prefer to deal with Indonesia than an independent Papua and I believe the international world still looks at that way,” he said.

The central bank has detected 57,380 counterfeit bank notes in circulation during the first half of the year, but police warned on Tuesday that money counterfeiting usually peaks in the days before, during and after Ramadan.

The Muslim fasting month is often seized upon as an ideal moment to use counterfeit money because of the increase in transactions as people buy more food, jewelry, clothes and gifts.

According to Bank Indonesia, the number of fake bank notes detected declined from 70,104 in the first half of last year.

The 57,380 counterfeit notes included 33,272 counterfeit Rp 100,000 notes and 20,217 counterfeit Rp 50,000 notes. Their total face value was at least Rp 4.34 billion ($512,000).

Most of the fake notes, a total of 48,844, were in circulation in Jakarta.

Wijayanti Yuwono, head of Bank Indonesia’s money distribution bureau, told the Jakarta Globe that although counterfeit money distribution apparently declined this year, people needed to remain vigilant.

Jakarta Police spokesman Sr. Comr. Baharudin Djafar said the counterfeit money was usually brought into circulation in crowded places.

“The distribution is usually done during transactions that take place in a crowded place and when a quick transaction is required, like at a toll road entrance or in mall or a market, where the victims do not have time to check the money they received,” he said.

“A quiet place can also become a target for distribution, though, such as food or beverage stalls in small towns where the victims do not have the necessary equipment to detect counterfeit money,” he added.

Baharudin said Ramadan and other major religious events offered an ideal opportunity for money counterfeiters because people spend more than they normally do during those times.

Wijayanti said that before any transaction involving a large sum, the receiving party should first have the money checked at the nearest bank.

If anyone is not sure whether the money in question is genuine, she said, it would be better to bring it to a bank because fake bills can be detected there.

However, she said there were easy ways to detect if bank notes were genuine or not, and any citizen could learn them.

“First of all, we can feel the texture of the bill. Counterfeit bank notes [usually] are printed on glossy paper and they don’t have a code for blind people,” she continued. “Secondly, counterfeit bank notes often have brighter or darker colors than genuine money.”

She added that genuine notes had a security thread, miniature text and a watermark image usually looking to the right, while the watermark image on counterfeit ones look to the left.

“The last and easiest way to identify real notes is by looking at the optically variable ink on the Bank of Indonesia symbol. When the money is moved, the color changes, like from yellow to green,” she said.

Wijayanti said the central bank was cooperating with the National Police to eradicate counterfeit money distribution.

“We do not know exactly how many counterfeit bank notes are in circulation because we only record it based on reports to banks or the police,” she said.

It is common during Ramadan for people to sell small-denomination bank notes — such as Rp 2,000, Rp 5,000 and Rp 10,000 — as give those to children during festivities after the end of the fasting month.

“There are many people who need smaller bank notes. I earn an extra Rp 10,000 for every Rp 100,000 in smaller notes that I sell,” Murniani, 33, who runs such a business in Jakarta’s Kota Tua, told the Globe.

A relatively quieter Ramadan may be in store this year after former Vice President Jusuf Kalla called on the Indonesian Council of Ulema to help control the volume of mosques’ call to prayer.

“There is no other country in the world except Indonesia where the call to prayer is deafening,” he said in a speech on Saturday addressed to the council, also known as the MUI, that was broadcast by local television stations.

“If [mosques] want to compete, they should do so based on the quality of the call to prayer, not the volume of their speakers.”

Umar Shihab, one of the chairmen of the MUI, told the Jakarta Globe on Sunday that the council responded positively to Kalla’s advice.

“We have to admit that there are many complaints about the loud calls to prayer during Ramadan, as if there is a competition,” Umar said.

“Apart from that, some of them start calling for prayers an hour or two hour before the schedule, when it it’s better to be done just 30 minutes before,” he said.

Umar said the MUI would ask mosques to heed the call and be more orderly.

“It should not be about which one is the first or the loudest to call for prayer,” he said. “It should be about the quality of the prayer, because Islam is an orderly and beautiful religion.”

Last December, the Praya District Court in West Nusa Tenggara sentenced an American man to five months in jail for blasphemy for pulling the plug on a mosque’s loudspeaker during a prayer reading during Ramadan last year.

Droves of moviegoers flocked back to hundreds of cinemas across the country on Friday to see the boy wizard defeat Voldemort once and for all on the big screen.

That the screening of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” — the biggest blockbuster so far this year — marked the end of Indonesia’s Hollywood film dry spell appeared to be a worthy conclusion to the long drawn-out saga.

But worries remain that a sequel might be in store.

New Actor

Controversy has surrounded Omega Film, the company largely responsible for bringing Hollywood blockbusters back to Indonesian theaters, from the start.

After the Motion Pictures Association of America and Cineplex 21 announced that no films from major Hollywood studios would be brought into the country from Feb. 17 pending the resolution of a dispute with the government over royalty calculations, the Finance Ministry responded by announcing a ban on three film importers that collectively owed Rp 30 billion ($3.4 million) in import taxes.

It was later discovered that two of the three banned importers were Camila Internusa Film and Satrya Perkasa Esthetika Film, both affiliated with Cineplex 21 and responsible for bringing in MPAA films.

With the ban on the two importers in place, the eventual resolution of the royalty dispute last month failed to bring back Hollywood blockbusters.

When news emerged that a new company, which was named Omega Film and believed to be related to Cineplex 21, had been granted an import license, moviegoers thought they had found their hero.

But as with all good films, the plot quickly thickened.

First, there were questions over why it was the only one of six new companies that applied for a film import license to be granted one.

Susiwijono Moegiarso, a director at the customs office, on Thursday denied allegations of special treatment.

“Yes, there were six companies, including Omega Film, that applied for film import licenses,” he said. “But it needs to be understood that Omega Film applied for an import license in April, and the other five just applied in May and June. So Omega Film got its license earlier.”

Susiwijono added that the license applications of the five others had not been rejected, but rather investigations into the companies were ongoing. “Hopefully, they’ll be done next week,” he said.

Then on July 5, the customs office suddenly froze Omega’s license, saying the company had not fulfilled all requirements. Suspiciously, Omega had the same office address as the five other companies.

But 10 days later, the customs office lifted the ban on Omega, “because they had completed the requirements and explained the company to us — its organizational structure, the directors and commissioners, whether they had the competency or not,” Susi wijono said.

Monopoly fears

Lawmakers have questioned this sudden lift of the ban, alleging something akin to deus ex machina (god out of the machine), the plot device that sees an unexpected power step in to resolve a seemingly hopeless situation.

An alleged relationship to Cineplex 21 and even to the ruling family have been floated as reasons for the positive turn of events in Omega’s way.

Syamsul Lussa, head of the film department at the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, said one of Omega’s directors is Ajay Fulwani, who, according to cinema pioneer and film importer Ilham Bintang, is a nephew of Harris Lesmana, one of Cineplex 21’s big bosses. There were also rumors that lawmaker and Democratic Party secretary general Edhie Baskoro Yudhoyono, the president’s son, was also involved.

Tourism Minister Jero Wacik dismissed all this, and subsequent allegations of a Cineplex 21 monopoly over the film industry.

As long as the names of a company’s directors and commissioners were not similar to those of the cinema company, “then it is not a monopoly,” Jero said.

He acknowledged that 80 percent of Indonesia’s 676 screens were owned by Cineplex 21, but pointed out that this only meant it dominated the industry, not monopolized it.

And he denied rumors of the ruling family’s involvement. “Bringing Cikeas into the Omega Film issue is very cynical. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is very concerned about this,” he said. “I asked Edhie Baskoro and he said no.”

Cineplex 21 spokesman Noorca Massardi could not be reached for comment.

Djonny Sjafruddin, head of the Indonesian Cinema Companies Union (GPBSI), has also defended Cineplex 21 over the monopoly claims.

“The Business Competition Supervisory Commission [KPPU] has already investigated [Cineplex 21] twice and did not find any evidence of a monopoly,” he said.

Tadjudin Noer Said, a commissioner at KPPU, acknowledged that the cinema industry was dominated by one player, but he explained that as long as it did not control prices, then it was not considered a monopoly.

Still, Syamsul has said that “if there is dodgy data about Omega Film, we are going to revoke its business permit.”

If that happens, Indonesia may very well see a sequel to the Hollywood boycott.

One thing lost in the complex web the Hollywood film boycott has spun is the reason the government gave for wanting to hike taxes on film imports in the first place: to stimulate the local film industry.

Just days after the boycott began on Feb. 17, Tourism Minister Jero Wacik said the president, prompted by a comment from director Hanung Bramantyo in the local media about improving the domestic industry without imposing new taxes, had asked him to review the proposed tax regime.

On Thursday, Jero finally announced the plan to help the struggling industry, outlining a new company that would help fund local projects.

“We are going to establish Indonesian Film Finance to provide low-interest loans to Indonesian filmmakers,” he said. “This way we can help to improve the quantity and quality of Indonesian films.”

Aside from the help with funding, Jero said the Finance Ministry had also agreed to eliminate taxes on the importation of film production equipment. “Film production equipment and materials have always been listed as luxury items and therefore were slapped with high taxes,” he said.

However, Jero said it was not possible to do away with the value-added tax, either on domestic or foreign films. “So instead of revoking the value-added tax on domestic films, we are going to reduce the tax to a minimum level,” he said.

The country’s film industry has suffered a downturn in recent years. In 2009, only six local films sold more than a million tickets each at the box office. In 2010, only one movie broke the million mark.

Last year, 81 Indonesian films had cinema releases, slightly down from 83 films in 2009, although a significant decline from 91 big-screen releases in 2008. Even without Hollywood blockbusters, 75 foreign films were imported in the first seven months of this year.

The government is hoping to double local film production to about 200 a year by 2014 to equal the number of foreign films imported.

Jero said he wanted that ratio to eventually be 60 percent local films to 40 percent foreign.

In March, the minister also said the government was planning to allocate a special budget to subsidize the production of films that “instill love in the nation, raise patriotism and national defense.” But that plan was quickly panned.

“Filmmakers will try to meet the criteria needed to get the subsidy instead of focusing their creative efforts on producing a quality film,” Joko Anwar, a prominent director, said at the time.