Indonesia coronavirus: Isis affiliates wooing new recruits unhappy with pandemic policies, experts say

The extremist groups are using public unhappiness with Jakarta’s response to the pandemic as fuel for their efforts, online as well as offline

There are also still more than 550 children of Indonesian Isis recruits in Syria, according to a source, raising fears they will be radicalised too

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Pedestrians in Jakarta wear face masks as a precaution against the spread of Covid-19. Photo: AP

Published: 1:00pm, 25 Aug 2020Updated: 9:53pm, 25 Aug 2020

Indonesian affiliates of Islamic State (Isis) are actively recruiting people during Covid-19 movement restrictions as they look to propagate a caliphate in the world’s most populous Muslim nation, according to analysts and a returnee from Syria.

Jakarta’s poor handling of the coronavirus pandemic has seen infections soar to 155,412, with 6,759 deaths, the highest fatality count in Southeast Asia.

Unemployment has spiked and more people in the informal sector – estimated to make up between 60 and 70 per cent of the economy – are struggling due to movement restrictions and low consumer spending over recession fears.

Public dissatisfaction has fuelled Isis’ propaganda efforts, according to Febri Ramdani, who went to Syria in 2016 to find 18 members of his family after they secretly left to live under the extremist group’s rule. Indonesia’s foreign ministry rescued Febri and his family in 2017.

“The people are a bit unhappy with the government’s handling of the pandemic, and this is the opportunity for extremist groups to come in with their propaganda that an Islamic state must be established … that it would solve all their problems and the pandemic would end,” said Febri, who was speaking after a webinar organised by the Centre for Radicalism and Deradicalisation Studies (PAKAR).

As people spent more time online during the pandemic, he feared that some – particularly young people who were lonely, in a state of confusion or jobless – would come across content spread by extremist groups.

“There is a need to cross check everything that you read on the internet. I did not do that when I was searching for my family in Syria,” said Febri, adding that he was “shocked, lonely and depressed” they had left without telling him.