Amien says Muhammadiyah has no conflicts

JAKARTA (JP): Chairman of the Muhammadiyah reformist Moslem organization, Amien Rais, denies any internal rift occurring in connection with next month's chairmanship election.

"There is no such thing as the `poles of Jakarta and Yogyakarta' in Muhammadiyah," he said yesterday, referring to two major branches of the organization. "Neither are ulemas pitted against intellectuals."

"There are people who say that there are conflicting sides within Muhammadiyah, but those so-called poles are imaginary," he told the Antara news agency in Yogyakarta.

He acknowledged only the existence of small groups trying to disrupt the organization from within.

"These parasites should be eliminated. But the organization itself is growing healthily," he said, without making specific allusions to anyone.

The congress is expected to proceed smoothly and compactly and to serve as an example for other congresses, he said confidently.

The organization will hold its 43rd congress and elect its new leadership in Banda Aceh from July 6 to July 10.

For the last several weeks, speculation has been rife as to whether the organization will be able to iron out alleged differences among various groups during the congress.

However, a number of scholars, including political scientist Afan Gaffar of the Yogyakarta-based Gadjah Mada University, have said that there are groups standing on opposite poles in the organization. He said there are leaders who are loyal to the organization, and there are those who only seek personal gain from it.

But yet another prominent scholar took the opposite view. Political observer Maswadi Rauf from the University of Indonesia optimistically said that there is only a small chance that conflicts will occur during the chairmanship elections because "there is no rigid dichotomy" within Muhammadiyah.

Unlike the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) organization, which is currently chaired by controversial scholar Abdurrahman Wahid, Muhammadiyah does not appear to have pronounced differences among its members' views, he said.

For instance, there are no people who are overly "pro" or "against" the government, Maswadi told The Jakarta Post. "There's no such dichotomy," he said.

"I don't think there are going to be sharp conflicts occurring in the congress. At least I haven't seen signs of such conflicts," he said.

"I believe the organization will be able to avert full-blown conflicts because most of the leading members are intellectuals who don't have radically contradictory views," he said.

Maswadi also said he believed the government would take a milder stance regarding the election of the new Muhammadiyah leadership, and would not interfere as much as it did during the election of the NU's executive board in December last year.

"The government is not as concerned as it was then over who's going to be the new chairman," Maswadi said. "I believe it's the same for the government, whether the congress elects Amien or Lukman Harun, or anybody else."

"There are great opportunities for prospective candidates to compete honestly," Maswadi said.

Lukman Harun is a former leading member of the organization, on whom analysts have slapped various labels, including "government lobbyist".

Afan

Afan Gaffar said yesterday in Yogyakarta that Muhammadiyah will have a more marked "political nuance" if it elects Amien Rais next month. "This is a logical consequence of the character of that leader," he said.

Afan himself has been inviting criticism over his analysis of the organization's leaders. Minister of Religious Affairs Tarmizi Taher has said that Afan stepped over the line when he said there were some Muhammadiyah leaders who were looking out only for their own political interests.

"His analysis was way out of line," Tarmizi was quoted by Antara as saying yesterday. "It's not true that there are groups of such leaders in Muhammadiyah.

"Muhammadiyah has developed and matured. There are no internal problems, so it's not true that it has three groups of leaders."

Afan grouped Amien Rais and several other leaders as those who are loyal to the organization, Lukman Harun and Djazman Al Kindi as those who only seek a livelihood from it, and intellectuals Din Syamsuddin and Watik Pratiknya as those who threaten to use the organization as a steppingstone to further their political interests.

Tarmizi also reiterated the government's non-interference stance on the congress, saying it will not favor any candidate over the others. (swe/har/02)