Local residents and members of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), a radical Islamist group, protested on 23 September outside a church building in the city of Makassar, South Sulawesi, angered by the renewal of the church’s building permit.
The protests in Makassar began after complaints from local residents that the church did not have the required papers to renew the permit. ‘The presence of the church in this area does not have the approval of most of the Muslim population’, said an FPI spokesman. ‘Residents said they never gave permission for the renewal of the project.’
A 1969 law regulating places of worship in Indonesia (the world’s most populous Muslim country) was revised in 2006. Amongst the amendments is the requirement that applicants for new places of worship must obtain supporting signatures from at least 60 local households of other (i.e. non-Christian) faiths.
Mayoral visit
The Revd Daur Snape Rurun dismissed the complaints, insisting the local authorities had issued the required papers. ‘Do not worry about permits and legal papers’, he said, ‘because, after we laid the first stone of the church, the mayor visited the site and officially recognised the project.’ Hamzah Hamid, a local politician, added that the protestors had no right to carry out demonstrations against church construction.
Over 1,000 churches have been closed since the amendments were introduced. Last year, Indonesia’s Home Affairs minister, Tjahjo Kumolo, said he will consider revising the restrictive legislation.
