Home Minister Tjahjo Kumolo has inaugurated high-ranking National Police officer Comr. Gen. M. Iriawan, who once served as the provincial police chief, as an acting governor to replace incumbent West Java Governor Ahmad Heryawan, whose term as the province’s head ended on June 13.

“I, on behalf of the President, officially inaugurate Comr. Gen. M. Iriawan as West Java’s acting governor. I believe you will do your job well and according to your responsibilities,” Tjahjo said during the ceremony on Monday.

The ceremony was held at Gedung Merdeka in the West Java provincial capital of Bandung and was attended by a number of officials, including Ahmad, who wished his successor good luck during the former’s speech.

Prior to his appointment as West Java’s acting governor, Iriawan had been the main secretary of the National Resilience Institute (Lemhanas) since March 8. The three-star general was also appointed West Java and Jakarta Police chief in 2013 and 2016, respectively.

Speaking to journalists after the ceremony, Iriawan said he had been contacted by the minister regarding his appointment and the inauguration on the second day of Idul Fitri celebrations on Saturday.

“My family and I were in Surabaya [East Java] visiting relatives when the minister called, so I went back right away to Jakarta. As a soldier, I’m ready to do what the country has ordered me to do,” Iriawan said.

He added that he would focus on serving West Java residents as well as the provincial state officials’ neutrality during the upcoming gubernatorial election.

West Java is among 171 regions participating in the 2018 simultaneous regional elections, which will be held on June 27. (kuk) </s> Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, commonly known as Ahok, is alleged to have insulted Islam by criticizing his opponents' use of a Quranic verse in a stump speech.

Police estimated 200,000 people took to the streets, CNN Indonesia reported. Many shouted inflammatory slogans, such as "kill Ahok," and "kill Ahok for insulting Islam."

Others carried signs demanding the death penalty for the official, and many marched with masks covering their faces to obscure their identities.

As many as 18,000 police and military personnel have been deployed for Friday's protest, and an inner ring of approximately 100 armed military guards are outside the Governor's residence, CNN Indonesia says.

There are fears that ISIS, and al-Qaeda, through its Indonesian proxy Jemaah Islamiyah, could seek to ferment violence. During a November 1 discussion on the rally at the Wahid Institute, Sidney Jones, Jakarta-based director of the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict, explored the influence of foreign jihadists on the protesters. She said jihadist-run accounts on social media urged sympathizers of these groups to fan the flame of jihad in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. Police have called on demonstrators to exercise their right to protest and freedom of expression in a peaceful manner. Residents have been warned to avoid the protest route and avoid sharing "unclear... provocative and incorrect information" on social media, Police Chief Tito Karnavian said in a statement. The rally originates at Istiqlal Mosque in Central Jakarta and will end at the Presidential palace. Governments, including the UK and Australia, have urged their citizens in the city to exercise caution. Conservative Islamist opponents say that Ahok, who is a Christian of Chinese descent, should not administer a Muslim-majority city. They had previously quoted a verse from the Muslim holy book at a rally, which warns against Muslims allying themselves with non-believers. Ahok is a key ally of President Joko Widodo and was his deputy when Widodo -- also known as Jokowi -- was governor of Jakarta. Ahok is now the frontrunner in the 2017 gubernatorial race. Indonesian President Joko Widodo with Ahok after the latter's swearing in as governor on November 19, 2014. Jokowi has called for calm and is seeking support from Prabowo Subianto, his opponent in next year's presidential election. Former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, whose son is running against Ahok, made a speech two days ago calling for the governor to be persecuted to placate the Islamist opposition and quell the protests. Protesters gather on October 14, calling for Ahok arrest and imprisonment. There are suggestions that Jokowi's government isn't doing enough to buttress against Islamist hardliners. When video of Ahok speaking out against the Quranic verse appeared online in October, there was widespread outrage from conservative, religious quarters, but at the time, critics say, the government did little to dampen down extremist reaction. "Pluralist politicians, like President Jokowi, were silent," Jones wrote at the beginning of November. "No one said, 'Let's stop this in it tracks.' Neither the President nor Vice-President did anything to try to cool tempers." </s> Metrotvnews.com, Jakarta: The Jakarta Metro Police chief Inspector General Mochamad Iriawan has confirmed that the Jakarta runoff election run smoothly.



 The election was held on Wednesday morning. It was competed by incumbent Jakarta Governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama and former education minister Anies Rasyid Baswedan.

The polling stations were opened from 07.00-13.00 local time. They were guarded by police, military and Satpol PP officers."The situation was conducive," Iriawan said.The offficial result will be announced early May. The winner will be inaugurated at the end of the year.(WAH) </s> JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesian President Joko Widodo said on Thursday he had chosen 75-year-old Islamic cleric Ma’ruf Amin as his running mate in next year’s presidential election.

Gerindra Party leader Prabowo Subianto waves to reporters as he arrives for a meeting with former Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono at the Yudhoyono's residence in Jakarta, Indonesia August 9, 2018 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Muhammad Adimaja/via REUTERS

The two will be challenged by former general Prabowo Subianto and his vice presidential candidate pick, the deputy governor of Jakarta, Sandiaga Uno.

Indonesia, the world’s third-largest democracy and biggest Muslim-majority country, goes to the polls in April.

The contest, at least in terms of the presidential candidates, is shaping up as a repeat of the 2014 election, when political outsider Widodo defeated Prabowo, who has deep ties to Indonesia’s business and military elite.

Widodo is a popular moderate who has had mixed success with his reform agenda. Prabowo is a charismatic nationalist with strong links to Islamists who frequently rails against foreigners.

On a dramatic day of political maneuvering and intrigue, Widodo made a surprise decision to pick Amin, just hours after former chief justice Mahfud MD appeared to confirm he was the vice presidential choice of Widodo.

Amin is the influential head of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI), who issued a statement condemning Widodo’s political ally, the ethnic Chinese Christian former Jakarta governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, as a blasphemer for insulting the Koran in the middle of a heated Jakarta election campaign.

Prabowo’s candidate for Jakarta governor won the election, which analysts and rights advocates condemned for inflaming sectarian sentiment.

Amin had been a presidential adviser and had served in local and national legislatures in the past.

“Maybe there are questions from the people all over Indonesia why Professor Dr. Ma’ruf Amin was chosen. Because he is a wise religious figure,” said Widodo.

“I think we complete each other, nationalistic and religious.”

Related Coverage Prabowo Subianto says to run again for Indonesian president in 2019 election

But Human Rights Watch researcher Andreas Harsono told Reuters Amin, as head of the MUI, had overseen a rise in religious intolerance across Indonesia, a pluralist country with significant minority communities.

“He issued fatwas condemning religious and gender minorities like the Ahmadiyah and LGBT individuals at a time they were subject to violent assaults,” he said.

DIVISIONS

“He also oversaw the creation of so-called religious harmony forums across the country. These forums replaced the principle of religious freedom, stoked divisions and favored the majority Sunni Muslim community.”

Prabowo said his candidacy was supported by three political parties, but left out the Democrat Party in his nomination speech in an apparent sign of rifts in the opposition coalition.

“It is not easy to build a coalition because many things have to be brought together,” Prabowo said.

The Democrat Party views the choice of Uno as a betrayal. Just last week, chairman of the party, former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and Prabowo’s Gerindra party announced an alliance.

Agus Yudhoyono, a 39-year-old retired soldier and the ex-president’s son, was expected to be the vice presidential candidate after the deal.

An hour before Prabowo’s near-midnight announcement, the Democrat party threatened to quit the coalition unless Prabowo went with the younger Yudhoyono or reconsidered his pick for running mate, party secretary general Andi Arief said on his Twitter account.

Arief had earlier tweeted a stream of derogatory comments about Prabowo.

Former investment banker Uno said he would work with Prabowo “to present a strong government ... build the economy and stabilize food prices”.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo and Vice President Jusuf Kalla speak with the media after holding a closed meeting at the Vice President's office, Jakarta, Indonesia August 9, 2018 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Wahyu Putro A/via REUTERS

Uno played a pivotal role plotting the campaign to oust then incumbent governor Purnama. After the victory, Uno said it was regrettable race and religion had dominated the campaign.

Gerindra’s deputy chairman Arief Poyuono said the Prabowo-Uno team would mean the opposition had candidates from both Java and outside Indonesia’s most populous island. Uno has roots in Gorontalo in Sulawesi.

Many Indonesians from outside Java resent Java’s political and economic dominance. </s> Governor of Indonesia's capital Basuki Tjahaja Purnama shows his ballot during an election for Jakarta's governor in Jakarta, Indonesia, February 15, 2017. REUTERS/Beawiharta

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesian Islamist groups on Monday called on the government to suspend the Christian governor of the capital and for the courts to convict him of blasphemy, demands they will make again at a rally outside parliament on Tuesday.

Islamist groups have held two big rallies since November against the governor of Jakarta, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, who is on trial for insulting the Koran, and in the midst of an election in which he hopes to win a second term.

"Our demands to parliament are that they urge the government to suspend Purnama ... and urge the Supreme Court and judges to detain him and impose the maximum sentence," said Muhammad al Khaththath of the Islamic People's Forum.

The forum is one of the groups organizing the Tuesday rally.

Previous rallies drew hundreds of thousands of people and raised concern about the erosion of religious tolerance in the world's most populous Muslim-majority country.

Purnama, Jakarta's first ethnic Chinese and Christian leader, denies insulting the Koran.

He has been allowed to remain in office while the court case is going on but faces up to four years in prison if found guilty of blasphemy.

His supporters say the charge against him is politically motivated.

Last Wednesday, he stood against two Muslim candidates in a city governor election but none of them got enough votes to win outright.

A second round is due in mid-April with Purnama competing against a former education minister, Anies Baswedan, who has appealed to the Muslim vote in the city of more than 10 million.

Jakarta police have stepped up security ahead of Tuesday's demonstration which up to 10,000 people are expected to join, said police spokesman Argo Yuwono.

The Jakarta election is widely seen as a proxy battle for the next presidential election in 2019.

Purnama is a former deputy of President Joko Widodo, when Widido was Jakarta governor, and he is being backed by the president's party.

Baswedan is backed by a retired general, Prabowo Subianto, who Widodo defeated in the last presidential election, in 2014, and who is promising a political comeback. </s> JAKARTA: Indonesian President Joko Widodo has chosen 75-year-old cleric Ma’ruf Amin as his running mate in next year’s presidential election, he said on Thursday, in a sign he wants to bolster his Islamic credentials.

The two will likely be challenged by former general Prabowo Subianto. On a dramatic day of political manoeuvring and intrigue, Jakarta’s deputy governor, Sandiaga Uno, was identified as a “99 per cent” certainty by a senior official from Prabowo’s Gerindra Party to be his running mate.

But Amin’s elevation may prompt a re-think, said Yusuf Martak, a cleric from the National Movement for Guarding Ulemas Fatwas, an Islamist group counselling Prabowo. Indonesia, the world’s third-largest democracy and biggest Muslim-majority country, goes to the polls in April.

The contest, at least in terms of the presidential candidates, is shaping up as a repeat of the 2014 election, when political outsider Widodo defeated Prabowo, who has deep ties to Indonesia’s business and military elite. Widodo is a popular moderate who has had mixed success with his reform agenda. Prabowo is a charismatic nationalist with strong links to Islamists who frequently rails against foreigners. </s> Read the Indonesian version here

On Monday, the governor of Jakarta, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, attended a celebration of the Prophet Muhammad’s birthday at a mosque in the Indonesian capital. An Indonesian of Chinese ethnicity, and a Christian, he joined devotees singing a religious song along with Muslim celebrants on stage.

He asked the audience to pray for him because the following day he was due in court, charged with blaspheming Islam. “Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your prayers,” he said.

The governor, widely known as Ahok, needs all the goodwill he can get. He is the highest-ranking Indonesian official to have ever been charged with insulting a religion in Indonesia. Many already fear that the trial will end in guilty verdict.

Ahok, whose appointment to the Indonesian capital’s top job was opposed by hard-line Muslims, was accused of insulting Islam in a campaign speech on Sept. 27. In the address, he said that religious conservatives who cited a Quranic verse in support of their position that Christians should not hold high office were being duplicitous. He told a crowd: “Ladies and gentlemen, you don’t have to vote for me — because you’ve been lied to by those using [the Quran’s] Surah al-Maidah verse 51.” (An edited transcript and video of his speech that twisted his statement went viral and helped fan public anger.)

Read: Jakarta’s Governor Was Questioned for Hours by Police as Part of a Blasphemy Probe

In the past two months, the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) and other hard-line Muslim groups led three massive protests that paralyzed downtown Jakarta, demanding the governor be jailed and the ouster of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, whose party endorsed Ahok’s candidacy in the gubernatorial election. Jokowi attended prayers with the demonstrators on Dec. 2 — a move that helped defuse the political tension directed toward him but risked giving legitimacy to the anti-Ahok and anti-Chinese sentiments. “The Politics of Mobocracy,” read the cover of news magazine Tempo English magazine last week, over an image of the rally.

Although moderate Muslim leaders and scholars have maintained Ahok’s innocence, public opinion has started to turn against the once popular governor. In a survey released last week, 45% of respondents said Ahok had insulted Islam, though 88.5% said they didn’t know exactly what he said. “If they didn’t exactly know about Ahok’s statement, then they agreed there was a religious blasphemy or not, what was it based on?” was the question posed by pollster Saiful Muljani in local media.

Ahok’s trial is not the only religiously motivated legal challenge that is ongoing at Indonesia’s courts. This year, an Islamic pro-family group that calls itself the Family Love Alliance — it is also known by its Indonesian initials AILA — filed a judicial review to the Constitutional Court to criminalize gay sex and nonmarital sex. There are fears that, if it succeeds, it will open the path for more legal persecution of other minority groups.

These two recent cases signal not only the growing intolerance toward ethnic, religious and sexual minorities in Indonesia — but also the tug of war between Islamist and secular forces in the country that has been going on for decades.

Indonesia — which has the world’s biggest Muslim population, is a secular country with a separation between state and church, where minority groups are supposed to be treated equal before the law. The secular principle started when the founding fathers agreed to drop the inclusion of Shari‘a in the nation’s constitution — allegedly to accommodate the wishes of religious minorities, especially those in the eastern part of the sprawling, culturally diverse archipelago.

However, the fear now is that Indonesia’s democracy is being hijacked by hard-line and ultraconservative groups. There are both jihadists, who dream of establishing an Islamic state in the country through violent means, and groups who seek to push an Islamist agenda through political and social channels.

As a result, the aims of the constitution are being perverted. According to Indonesia’s criminal code, for example, homosexuality isn’t illegal. But at the Constitutional Court, a so-called expert witness for AILA argued that universal human rights weren’t applicable in Indonesia because the country was built on religious norms.

Hundreds of thousands of Indonesian Muslims in Jakarta on Dec. 2, 2016, hold a peaceful protest against the Jakarta governor who is accused of insulting Islam. The protesters demand the acceleration of legal proceedings against Governor Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama Anadolu Agency—Getty Images

Meanwhile, in a sermon in front of President Jokowi and Cabinet ministers during the Dec. 2 rally, FPI leader Habib Rizieq Shihab said that “God’s law is above everything, that holy verses are above the constitution’s.”

Jokowi recently announced that he would set up a task force to tackle the issue of intolerance. “Apart from Muslims, Indonesia is also home to Christians, Catholics, Hindus, Buddhists and Confucians,” Jokowi said earlier in the Bali Democracy Forum last week. “The peace values are upheld by all religious adherents in Indonesia.”

However, as a politician he has also sought help from religious leaders and has left hard-line groups like the FPI alone. Now, while maintaining a ostensibly neutral stance, Jokowi has effectively thrown Ahok under the bus, saying flatly: “I will not protect brother Basuki Tjahaja Purnama.”

The Ahok trial — like the LGBT judicial review at the Constitutional Court — is a litmus test of Indonesia’s commitment to its principle as a secular, inclusive and tolerant country. So far, it is failing that test.

Contact us at editors@time.com. </s> JAKARTA - Indonesia President Joko Widodo on Thursday (Aug 9) picked cleric Ma'ruf Amin as his running mate for next year's presidential elections, in a surprising move that is seen as an attempt to bolster his Islamic credentials.

Ma'ruf Amin, 75, chairman of the Indonesia Ulema Council (MUI), will run as the vice-presidential candidate in the April 17 polls, where Mr Joko is expected to face former general Prabowo Subianto in an election to lead South-east Asia's biggest economy.

Mr Joko made the decision after meeting leaders of his nine coalition parties.

He said his decision followed deep contemplation and suggestions from various groups as well as approval from party leaders.

"Maybe there are questions from the people all over Indonesia why Professor Dr Ma'ruf Amin was chosen. Because he is a wise religious figure," said Mr Joko.

"We complement each other, representing nationalist and religious figures," he said.

Mr Joko's decision ended months of speculation about who would be his V-P candidate. Just hours before the announcement, there was heavy speculation that the president would pick former Constitutional Court chief Mahfud MD.

Apart from his key role in MUI, Mr Ma'ruf is the supreme leader of Indonesia's largest Islamic organisation Nahdlatul Ulama and has a track record as a regional legislator and lawmaker. He was a member of the People's Consultative Assembly, or MPR, and the Presidential Advisory Board.

He is a graduate of Bogor-based Ibnu Khaldun University,

However, Mr Ma'ruf and MUI have also played other roles in politics that are not without controversy.

One example quoted by his critics is the MUI statement that condemned former Jakarta governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama - an ethnic Chinese Christian who was an ally of Mr Joko - as a blasphemer for insulting Islam's holy book the Quran in the Jakarta gubernatorial election last year.

The Islamic cleric began to weave a closer relationship with Mr Joko after the massive demonstration against Mr Basuki in early November last year, according to local media reports.

There are worries in Indonesia that the tensions seen in the Jakarta election last year, which was marred by the fanning of racial and religious issues largely incited by hardline groups, will be repeated at the 2019 presidential race, which could threaten the re-election of Mr Joko.

Analysts have said that Mr Joko may need a strong Islamic figure as a running mate not only to counter his rivals who may use these religious issues, but also to lure voters in conservative strongholds in Indonesia's most-populated island of Java.

In 2014 election campaign that Mr Joko eventually won, he was hit by an online smear campaign that his family was communist and he is of Chinese descent.

With the announcement by Mr Joko’s camp, all eyes are now on his contender, Mr Prabowo, who had been anticipated to declare his running mate on Thursday.

Candidates for the presidency and vice-presidency must submit their nomination by Friday (Aug 10).

A senior Gerindra party official said Jakarta’s deputy governor Sandiaga Uno is “99 per cent” certain to become Mr Prabowo’s pick, Reuters reported on Thursday.

Arya Fernandes, a political analyst from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, told The Straits Times that Mr Joko’s decision on Mr Ma’ruf reveals his willingness to accommodate interests of various political parties and compromise.

However, the move closes the possibility of the establishment of the third axis in the next polls, he added.

Mr Arya further said that after solving the Muslim vote issue, the equally-tough challenge will emerge if Mr Prabowo chose Mr Sandiaga, who represents a young leader, as youth voters might be attracted to the Prabowo-Sandiaga pair. </s> Indonesian President Joko Widodo has chosen a hardline Muslim cleric as his running mate in next year’s presidential election, hoping to improve his credentials among the country’s Islamic population.

“The meeting between Jokowi and other party leaders and secretaries-general decided to name Ma’ruf Amin as Jokowi’s running mate,” Widodo’s PKB party secretary-general Abdul Kadir Karding said on Twitter on Thursday.

Ma’ruf Amin, who was chosen from a list of 10 possible candidates, came as a surprise choice to many after former chief justice Mahfud MD claimed he was selected as Widodo’s vice presidential choice just hours earlier.

“Maybe there are questions from the people all over Indonesia why Professor Dr. Ma’ruf Amin was chosen. Because he is a wise religious figure,” said Widodo. “I think we complete each other, nationalistic and religious.”

Amin, who is the leader of the influential Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI), the country’s top Muslim clerical body that unites many Muslim organizations, has previously worked as a presidential adviser and has served in local and national legislatures in the past.

However, some human rights campaigners claim that Amin is a religious extremist who preaches discrimination against homosexuals and the enforcement of blasphemy laws.

“He issued fatwas condemning religious and gender minorities like the Ahmadiyah and LGBT individuals at a time they were subject to violent assaults,” Human Rights Watch researcher Andreas Harsono told Reuters.

“He also oversaw the creation of so-called religious harmony forums across the country,” Harsono added. “These forums replaced the principle of religious freedom, stoked divisions and favored the majority Sunni Muslim community.”

As noted by the Jakarta Post, Amin has previously “supported controversial regulations, including the Pornography Law and the joint ministerial decree banning the activities of minority group Ahmadiyah, saying in 2013 that such regulations were ‘very much expected.'”

Amin’s selection will cause concern among those opposed to Indonesia’s increasingly brutal approach to enforcing Sharia Law, with Indonesia still the world’s largest Islamic country and the world’s third largest democracy. Multiple public figures, including Governor of Jakarta Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, have been found guilty of violating Islamic blasphemy laws.

The country’s presidential election will take place in April of next year. The only other declared candidate thus far is Prabowo Subianto, a businessman, politician, and former Lieutenant General of the Indonesian National Armed Forces.

Follow Ben Kew on Facebook, Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at bkew@breitbart.com.
The Joko Widodo administration [id] of Indonesia appoints Mochamad Iriawan [id], an active police general, as acting governor of West Java bringing back dual function.