Gus Yahya Affirms Palace Does Not Interfere in NU Congress Affairs

Chairman of the Executive Board of Nahdlatul Ulama (PBNU), Yahya Cholil Staquf, known as Gus Yahya, has affirmed that there has been no interference from the Presidential Palace, including from President of the Republic of Indonesia Prabowo Subianto, in the holding of the 35th Nahdlatul Ulama Congress.

He asserted that the government has no interest in meddling in the organisation’s internal dynamics.

Gus Yahya explained that NU has a long track record of managing its organisational dynamics independently. Indeed, NU is older than the Republic of Indonesia.

“Nahdlatul Ulama is older than Indonesia. Nahdlatul Ulama was born in 1926, while Indonesia only proclaimed independence in 1945,” said Gus Yahya during a press conference at the PBNU office in Central Jakarta, quoted on Wednesday, 15 July 2026.

He said that as an organisation approaching a century in existence, NU possesses the maturity to resolve its various internal dynamics independently.

Gus Yahya acknowledged that there will always be parties with interests in an organisation as large as NU. However, he said, such efforts have never undermined the organisation’s independence.

“That there are parties who want to interfere, who want this or that, is quite normal. In any society there are parties with their own interests, and perhaps such attempts have been made for some time now,” he said.

“But we can see from the evidence that NU has always maintained its independence, its maturity, in resolving and working through organisational dynamics in a mature and independent manner,” he continued.

Furthermore, Gus Yahya said there is no reason for the President or the Palace to intervene in the NU Congress.

He even asserted that if anyone claims to have received the blessing or instruction of the President regarding the contest at the Congress, such a claim is untrue.

“And I do not see any interest on the part of the President or the Palace, for instance, to influence or meddle in NU’s affairs — what would be the point? There is no benefit for the government, none for the President himself,” he said.

“And if anyone claims to have been blessed, or even instructed, by the President, it is certainly a lie,” he concluded.