Aceh Capital to Sue Researchers For Naming It an 'Intolerant' City

A week ago, the research institute SETARA released its yearly report that ranks 94 Indonesian cities from "most tolerant" to "least tolerant". Banda Aceh, the capital of the only province in the country to practice Sharia Law, comes second to least tolerant in the list, and Mayor Aminullah Usman has had enough of his city being branded as intolerant. His plan? File a police report and press charges against the research institute.

“We can’t let this ranking hurt Banda Aceh," Aminullah said, as quoted by Kumparan on Tuesday."We will be assertive. We will sit down with lawyers to figure out a course of action to address this. Every year, Banda Aceh has consistently been branded an intolerant city by this organization."

The report, called the Tolerant City Index 2018, gives each of the 94 cities included a quantitative score based on variables such as local bylaws, the actions of city officials, and the relationships between entities in the city. The report records, among others, wether or not incidents where religious freedom is violated have happened in the last year, and if local governments have made sufficient efforts to maintain a diverse religious identity. This year, Banda Aceh ranks slightly better than the North Sumatran city of Tanjungbalai, and slightly worse than Jakarta.

SETARA Institute noted that some of the most common cases of intolerance in Indonesia come in the form of the spread of false news, hate speech, the restriction of the rights of people of minority groups, and letting people who display intolerant behavior get away with their actions.

Amrinullah strongly disagreed with the results of this research, saying that the majority of Muslims in Banda Aceh live in harmony with religious minorities. Teuku Zulkhairi, which heads the Department of Communication of Rabithah Thaliban Aceh, backs the mayor's views. “It’s like saying that Banda Aceh is an intolerant city just because we implement Sharia law,” he told local media.

Halili, the research director of SETARA Institute, maintains that the ranking considered more than just Aceh's practice of Sharia Law. The reason why the city sits so low in the ranking is because of its governmental and social regulations, among others, he said. For example, women, regardless of their religion, must wear a hijab when they leave the house, or risk being arrested by the Sharia police.

This isn't the first time that SETARA Institute has placed Banda Aceh in a low place in a ranking measuring tolerance. In the same report last year, the city also came second to least tolerant. Halili told VICE that the score has nothing to do with the law that is implemented in Aceh.

“We have no problem with Sharia Law. It's the discrimination that's written and implemented that we have a problem with,” Halili told VICE. “SETARA wasn’t being subjective to cities with strong Islam values. You can’t say that we’re anti-Islam. This is scientific research. Dozens of people were involved from in and outside SETARA to maintain the objectivity. We also talked to sources and other experts when we made this report.”

Some of the institutions that contributed to this report are Central Statistics Agency (BPS) and the National Commission on Violence Against Women.

“You have underestimated our credibility if you say that SETARA made this research subjectively. We can guarantee that this is very objective,” he said. “In our understanding, scientific research can only be compared to other research. You can’t criminalize research,” he concluded.