"God willing, I believe that the use of it (identity politics) will subside," Umar told journalists at the General Elections Commission (KPU) office in Jakarta, Friday, after chairing a hearing session of several leaders of high religious assemblies to the KPU.
According to the grand imam, the use of identity politics, especially in terms of religious affinity, would experience a decline in the 2024 elections, as the public today has gained a deeper maturity about religion and politics.
"The Indonesian public's maturity in religious and political affairs is getting better. We can now see people from different political parties having dinner together, even covering each other's bill," he stated.
Earlier, after chairing the hearing session, the imam stated that the KPU, along with several religious figures from religious high assemblies, agreed to work in collaboration to ensure that the 2024 elections did not disrupt harmony and interfaith concord in the homeland.
"This is a new tradition that we will exercise under the cooperation between religious high assemblies and KPU. I believe these are unprecedented efforts wherein we strive to find a way, so that people do not drag their religious emotion too far just to fight for a short-term interest," he pointed out.
He affirmed that this cooperation aims to ensure that the festival of democracy did not instead become an obstacle to the efforts to foster interfaith harmony in the nation.
To follow up on the cooperation agreement, Umar remarked that religious leaders would proceed to give directives to members of religious assemblies at the regional level to encourage the society to refrain from bringing in their religious emotions into the 2024 elections.
"It is necessary to ensure that people do not use their religious emotion out of place only for the sake of a momentarily interest," he stressed.
Moreover, he said, religious leaders will provide support to the KPU in the efforts to prompting contesting candidates of the elections to not use worship places as their stage to carry out their campaign.
The imam also invited all related parties to participate in the festival of democracy without committing anything that may interfere with the interfaith brotherhood in Indonesia.
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Translator: Tri Meilani, Tegar Nurfitra
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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