Kalla defends plan to fingerprint students of religious schools

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The government defended its plan to fingerprint all students of Islamic boarding schools (pesantren) as part of the antiterrorism drive despite opposition from some lawmakers and religious leaders, whom he asked not to display an "allergic reaction" to the proposal.

Addressing an international seminar on radical Islam organized by the State Islamic University (UIN), Vice President Jusuf Kalla explained that the proposal had been made in good faith.

"This is our war against the people who fight us, Indonesia, without any reason. This is total war," he told the seminar, which was attended by a number of ambassadors.

The government is aware that the fingerprinting proposal is a sensitive issue in the world's most populous Muslim nation. However, the government will proceed with the plan as it was aimed at protecting the country, Kalla said.

"There is no need for an allergic reaction. Look at it in a positive way," the Vice President urged his listeners.

Kalla had previously been successful in persuading Muslim leaders to pledge help to the government's efforts to curb the spread of militant ideas spread by terrorists, who in the past had recruited young men, including some from Islamic boarding schools, by manipulating the teaching of Islam.

The latest move, however, has drawn opposition from many quarters. Ali Maschan Moesa, the leader of the East Java chapter of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the largest Muslim organization in the country, said he was irritated by the plan as it placed the students of Islamic schools under suspicion, and presumed they posed a danger to national security.

In what may be effort to ease the situation, Minister of Religious Affairs Maftuh Basyuni denied the government would fingerprint the students of religious schools as part of the antiterror drive.

"It's excessive," Maftuh said when asked by reporters. However, he said the fingerprints of students could be taken if necessary to anticipate "something like a traffic accident".

Meanwhile, National Police chief Gen. Sutanto said the fingerprint plan was still only a proposal within the police, and denied rumors that the police had already started taking the fingerprints of religious school students.

"That's not correct. We have not taken any fingerprints. We have only taken copies of their ID cards," he said, adding that the police wanted to help religious schools to avoid "bad influence from external sources".

Meanwhile, Sidney Jones, the director of the International Crisis Group (ICG) in Jakarta, asked the government not to generalize radical Islam and terrorism as it could divert the government's antiterror efforts.

"Only half of the captured terrorists studied in pesantren, the others half studied in secular schools," said Jones, a terrorism expert.

Neither could the government blame poverty as the main cause of terrorism here as nearly all of the captured terrorists came from middle-class families, she added.

"The authorities could map it out by observing the backgrounds of the captured terrorists or interviewing the captured terrorists about their new recruits," Jones suggested, adding that the government could not win the battle of minds against terrorism simply by banning books published by the terrorists.