Fasting while in economic hardship

Fasting while in economic hardship

JAKARTA (JP): The fasting month of Ramadhan is here again and
Muslims are welcoming it with joy. Most Indonesians see the
Muslim holy month as a time when social conditions and solidarity
change for the better.

However, in general it depends on how you see it. To the
average person, the coming of Ramadhan is marked by the onslaught
of old women from rural areas hitting Jakarta's streets to beg.
They come here complete with "tour operators", who make the most
of the women's poverty to exploit urban citizens' sense of
solidarity. Muslims are urged to show more solidarity especially
during Ramadhan, so why not take advantage of people's
benevolence?

Many foreigners sincerely want to sympathize with the people
of this nation at this time of year and witness how they
implement their religious duties under the dire economic
hardships they face.

And goodness knows we need all the sympathy we can get since
the world knows our country is on the brink of bankruptcy.

Isn't it Indonesia that is burdened with the largest foreign
debt the in world? We are so poor that we have shamelessly
exported the world's greatest number of female workers. It all
happened because we let Soeharto, the most heartless tyrant in
the world who was the second longest serving dictator after
Cuba's Fidel Castro, rule us for more than three decades.

When this smiling general stepped down in 1998, he left behind
political and economic chaos. Indonesia was dubbed the world's
third most corrupt regime, and Soeharto's children and cronies
were reported to be among Asia's most wealthiest people. And two
years after he stepped down, people are still suffering from the
calamity he created.

Now how about our current President? If hearing is believing,
Gus Dur is not corrupt, and during this holy month we should
therefore pray to God Almighty that He will discourage him from
sampling the forbidden fruit. Also we should ask God to make him
stop producing confusing statements and forging strange
relationships with convicts or suspects of corruption because our
people have had enough of his inconceivable acts.

I also think his fanatic defenders need to rest during
Ramadhan so that they have time to repent for the sins they have
committed in defending the "saint". Islam discourages its
followers from profane talk, much less telling lies.

Our grassroots people appear to be extremely patient, despite
all the chaos created by Soeharto, and they can still welcome
Ramadhan with a sense of devotion. They are still happy to hear
the air vibrate with the humming of prayers and the recitation to
glorify the name of Allah. In this holy month they feel as if
they can see the color of the air they breath.

By abstaining from food and drink from dawn to sunset, Muslims
are expected to feel the hunger of the poor, whose number in
Indonesia has sharply increased. But can the destitute people
feel any more hungry since they have already done without for so
long? This is what makes Indonesia -- like some African
countries, perhaps -- very special.

At least most of our poor can be grateful to the Almighty
because they can still fast much more peacefully than their
brethren in the restive provinces of Aceh and Maluku, where they
listen to Koran recitals amid the hissing sounds of bullets. Or
than the former flamboyant prince of Soeharto's "Kingdom of
Cendana" who is being hunted by law enforcers around the clock.

Another show of solidarity in this holy month is the tradition
of some rich people -- and many are those who enjoyed high
positions in the old regime -- who open their houses to everyone
to break the fast. This is a positive sign of solidarity, but a
friend of mine, knowing I'm well-versed in Islamic law, asked me,
"Is it halal (allowed by Islamic law) to eat the food from the
table of a kleptomaniac veteran?"

I said: "How can you deem someone corrupt without any strong
evidence?"

He said the typical host of an open house always flaunts his
fortune, which everyone doubts he could have accumulate on his
salary, not even in a 100 years. "And mind you, our corrupt
officials are professional artists who know the art of disguising
their mentality and how to make people accept that they are
extremely wealthy and not ask any bold questions".

The man then mentioned an acquaintance of his, a social worker
who lives in a provincial capital. He runs an orphanage housing
120 orphans. One year during Ramadhan my friend saw him bending
over backwards to feed the poor children and provide them with
new clothes for Idul Fitri, the post-fasting festivity,
forgetting his own children at home. On the last day of Ramadhan
that year, this high-minded man burst into tears because he found
that two orphans did not get new clothes because there were not
enough for everyone at the orphanage.

-- Thayeb Ibnu Sabil