Unlike Islam Defenders Front (FPI) leader Habib Rizieq Shihab, who was immediately taken into police custody shortly after completion of his interrogation over this health protocol breach case, the police investigators sent the five suspects home.
They are head of the events' organizing committee Haris Ubaidillah; secretary of the events' organizing committee Ali Bin Alwi Alatas; and Idrus, in charge of the events' rundown; FPI commander in charge of security affairs Maman Suryadi; and FPI's general chairman responsible for the events Sobri Lubis.
"They are charged for violating Article 93 of the 2018 Health Quarantine that carries a jail term of one year. Hence, they are not detained," Jakarta Metropolitan Police spokesman Sen. Coms. Yusri Yunus notified journalists here, Monday.
Accompanied by their team of lawyers, Ubaidillah, Ali, and Idrus met with police investigators at 2 a.m. local time on Sunday, December 13, 2020, after their rapid tests showed "non-reactive" results, he stated.
Meanwhile, also accompanied by their lawyer, Maman Suryadi and Sobri Lubis showed up at the Jakarta Metropolitan Police headquarters for questioning on Monday morning (December 14, 2020).
According to local media reports, Lubis and Suryadi were not placed in detention after being interrogated with some 60 questions posed by the police investigators.
Last week, the Jakarta police investigators had named Shihab and these five figures as suspects over the violation of health protocols during the events at Shihab's home and the FPI headquarters in Petamburan, Jakarta, last month.
To prevent them from traveling abroad, the Jakarta Metropolitan Police had also appealed to the government's authorized agencies to impose 20-day travel bans on them.
Shihab, who was charged for violating Articles 160 and 216 of the Criminal Law, had appeared on Saturday (December 12, 2020), while five others that the police investigators charged for violating Article 93 of the 2018 Health Quarantine Law did not show up.
Shortly after facing 84 questions as part of the interrogation, the investigators decided to take Shihab into police custody.
According to National Police spokesman Inspector General Argo Yuwono, the FPI leader is being placed for 20 days in the detention center of the Jakarta Metropolitan Police's Narcotics Investigation Directorate from December 12, 2020.
Yuwono stated that police investigators had decided to detain Shihab based on objective and subjective considerations.
Among the points taken into account by the investigators to reach a decision on the suspect's custody were the length of prison term, which was potentially over five years, and efforts to prevent him from destroying evidence, fleeing, and committing similar crimes.
Speaking in connection with the Shihab case, the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) has pressed for applying fair law enforcement in the case of this well-respected FPI leader to avoid any offense to the public sense of justice in communities.
"Law must truly be used as an instrument for educating and not as an instrument for targeting," MUI Deputy Chairman Anwar Abbas had earlier stated.
The police's decision to name Shihab as a suspect for violating health protocols in holding events that led to the congregation of people must reflect the use of law as an instrument to edify rather than target, Abbas stated.
Abbas emphasized that law enforcement against Shihab and his men over the cases of holding crowd-drawing events must also be imposed fairly and equally on other community members found breaching the government's COVID-19 protocols in the country.
Failing to implement the principle of fair law enforcement and public sense of justice would only create unrest among members of the public, he cautioned.
"To this end, we hope, without exception, that all people or parties that have breached the COVID-19 rules, as the police have accused Habib Rizieq Shihab of having done, would also be named suspects," he affirmed.
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EDITED BY INE
Translator: Fianda SR, Rahmad Nasution
Editor: Fardah Assegaf
Copyright © ANTARA 2020
