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Indonesia’s Ma’ruf Amin to fight radicalisation that has spread from ‘play groups to government’
- The vice-president and senior cleric is seen as a figure who has the Islamic credentials to take on the country’s hardliners
- Religious radicalisation has spread from schools to the civil service, state-owned enterprises, police and military
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Indonesian Vice-President Ma’ruf Amin, 76, has been appointed by President Joko Widodo to lead the government’s campaign against the spread of radical ideologies, which the senior cleric said had “reached unimaginable places from preschool play groups to government institutions”.
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“The challenge is getting bigger because radicalism has a growing influence on society, not just among civil servants but also students. We even received reports that it has already found its way to the PAUD [preschool play groups],” Ma’ruf said in a recent interview with BeritaSatu TV.
Indonesia is grappling with a rise in radicalism along with the threat of terrorism, with recent attacks carried out by the country’s largest Isis affiliate, Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD).
Efforts to stem the rising tide of extremist ideology have taken on an added urgency following the discovery that two policewomen and one worker at state-owned PT Krakatau Steel were among dozens of terror suspects arrested in recent months.
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Religious radicalism has spread to “many fields” including the civil service, state-owned enterprises, police and military, said Parliamentarian Yaqut Cholil Qoumas from the Nation Awakening Party (PKB), the political party of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the country’s largest Muslim organisation.
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