Ulemas deny pardoning Harmoko

Ulemas deny pardoning Harmoko

JAKARTA (JP): The Ulemas Council (MUI), an umbrella group for
Indonesian Moslem organizations, denies forgiving Information
Minister Harmoko for allegedly offending Islam by twisting a
verse from the Koran.

Council chairman Hasan Basri said in Surabaya Saturday that
what he said in a press statement earlier this month was that the
influential body "understood" that Harmoko made a slip of the
tongue.

"No, no. We didn't say 'pardon' but we said 'could understand'
because to err is just human", Basri was quoted by the Antara
news agency.

Harmoko, who is also chief of the ruling Golkar party,
reportedly "mispronounced" the Al-Fatihah verse of the Koran when
he was opening a shadow puppet festival in the ancient Central
Javanese town of Surakarta in July.

Basri said that the council is not in a position to forgive
anyone making a mistake concerning Islam because only Allah has
the divine authority to do so.

"He (Harmoko) can pray for forgiveness to God. If there is any
impression that the council pardons him, it must be a
misinterpretation," he said.

Spearheaded by students, Moslems unhappy with the prompt
reaction from the council have held demonstrations in Yogyakarta
and Jakarta protesting both the council and Harmoko.

The prosecutor's office, which also has come under attack for
not enforcing the law the same way it has with a number of other
accused of committing similar offenses, has legally cleared
Harmoko of any wrongdoing on the grounds that he did it by
mistake. (pan)