Jakarta’s Christian governor was jailed for two years on Tuesday after being found guilty of committing blasphemy, capping a saga seen as a test of religious tolerance in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation.
Basuki Tjahaja Purnama was ‘convincingly guilty of committing blasphemy and is sentenced to two years in prison’, presiding judge Dwiarso Budi Santiarto told the Jakarta, Indonesia, court as he ordered the politician, known by his nickname Ahok, to be detained.
The 50-year-old was hauled into court last year to face trial for allegedly insulting Islam while campaigning for re-election in a case critics said was politically motivated.
Purnama, who has been called ‘fearless’ by political experts, said that he would file an appeal following the sentencing.
There was shock among his supporters outside the court and some wept openly.
Meanwhile, Islamic hardliners outside the court cheered as news of verdict emerged and shouted ‘God is greatest’.
Prosecutors had called for a suspended one-year jail sentence on charges of hate speech. The maximum sentence is four years in prison for hate speech and five years for blasphemy.
Hardline Islamist groups had called for the maximum penalty possible over comments by Purnama that they said were insulting to the Islamic holy book, the Koran.
In September last year, in a speech to a group of fisherman during early campaigning for the elections, he accused his opponents of using a Koranic verse to trick supporters into voting against him.
The comments were filmed and went viral online – providing ammunition for fringe hardline groups who had long railed against a non-Muslim leader ruling the capital and his political opponents who were keen to oust him from the job and embarrass his ally, Indonesian President Joko Widodo.
Widodo was a close ally of Purnama, an ethnic-Chinese Christian, and the verdict will be a blow to a government that has sought to quell radical groups and soothe investors’ concerns that the country’s secular values were at risk.
Despite Purnama’s apologies and insistence that he only intended to attack his rivals, not the Koran itself, hundreds of thousands of conservative Muslims took to the streets of Jakarta in mass rallies last year, organised by hardliners and encouraged by his rivals.
Under intense public pressure, authorities put him on trial for blasphemy and his popularity slumped.
He lost last month’s election to a Muslim rival, Anies Baswedan, and Tuesday was jailed for two years for blasphemy.
He will hand over to Baswedan in October.
Analysts say the radical Islamist groups that organized mass protests against Purnama had a decisive impact on the outcome of the election.
Rights group fear they are in the ascendant in a country where most Muslims practise a moderate form of Islam and which is home to sizeable communities of Hindus, Christians, Buddhists, and people who adhere to traditional beliefs.
Aleksius Jemadu, a political expert at Pelita Harapan University near Jakarta, praised Purnama for his ‘courageous attitude’.
‘Ahok is a rare figure, he’s fearless. He appeared when the Indonesian people were thirsting for an honest leader,’ he told AFP.
The government has been criticized for not doing enough to protect religious minorities but Widodo had urged restraint over the trial and called for all sides to respect the legal process.
His government said on Monday it would take legal steps to disband Hizb ut-Tahrir Indonesia (HTI), a group that seeks to establish an Islamic caliphate, because its activities were creating social tensions and threatening security.
During his time as governor, Purnama won much praise for his efforts to clean up the traffic-choked megacity but his popularity could not save him before the sentencing.
With his outspoken, combative style and can-do attitude, Purnama cut an unusual figure among the political elite in Muslim-majority Indonesia, where politicians typically take a more gentle, persuasive approach.
But the tall, bespectacled politician, who was the city’s first non-Muslim governor for half a century and first ever ethnic Chinese leader, quickly overcame any doubts about his leadership as he took concrete steps to improve the city of 10million.
The 50-year-old regularly railed against corruption in one of the world’s most graft-ridden countries and led sting operations to catch lazy bureaucrats, drawing praise from a public weary of the city’s inefficiences.
The former deputy governor inherited the top job in 2014 after his predecessor, Widodo, won the presidency.
On Purnama’s watch, roads were repaired, pavements improved, more parks started appearing in the city and its notoriously filthy rivers were cleaned up.
Some of his policies – particularly a drive to evict poor, riverside communities – caused anger, but many Jakartans said their lives had changed for the better since he took power.
Purnama was born into a well-off family on Belitung island in western Indonesia, and studied geology at university in Jakarta, before returning to his village and going into business.
His father urged him to use his talents to help those less fortunate than himself, and he entered local politics in 2004.
He was elected to the national parliament in 2009, where he met Widodo.
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