By Stevie Emilia
Indonesia, The Jakarta Post: Muslim leaders were urged Tuesday to thrown their weight behind a revitalized national family planning program, which had success during the New Order but has flagged since the advent of the reform era.
National Family Planning Coordination Agency (BKKBN) chairman Sugiri Syarief said Tuesday the success of the family planning program was closely linked to the involvement of religious leaders.
"Religious leaders play a central role within the community. They are people`s role models. People listen to their views and follow them," he said in Sanur, Bali, during the International Conference of Muslim Leaders to Support Population and Development Programs to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals.
Muslim organizations, in particular Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) and Muhammadiyah, the country`s two largest Muslim groups, have released edicts on family planning issues as far back as the 1960s.
One edict, issued in 1983 during the National Conference of Ulema, states that Islam supports family planning to protect the health of mothers and children.
The three-day conference in Bali, which was opened by Religious Affairs Minister Maftuh Basyuni on Tuesday, is being attended by 125 Muslim leaders from 14 countries, as well as representatives from the provinces, international organizations and donor institutions.
The event, which is expected to produce an action plan to assist Muslim leaders in their efforts to promote population and development issues in their respective communities, is a joint initiative between the government, the BKKBN, the United Nations Population Fund and the International Conference of Islamic Scholar (ICIS).
Nasarudin Umar, the director general of community guidance at the Religious Affairs Ministry, said a successful national family planning program was impossible without the backing of religious leaders. He said such support was necessary to counter "the people who use religious arguments to reject family planning and to maintain persisting views legitimizing discrimination (against women)".
Muslim leaders are seen as having played a less active role in family planning programs since the start of the reform era, with fewer sermons on the issue being delivered in mosques and at public gatherings.
NU deputy chairman M. Rozy Munir acknowledged that family planning issues were now rarely touched upon by religious leaders speaking at mosques.
"Family planning is important to lower population growth. It`s like the interest on a bank loan, it keeps on increasing," he said.
With around 220 million people, Indonesia is already the world`s fourth most populous nation and its population has grown by about four million people annually over the past few years.
NU chairman Hasyim Muzadi, who is also the secretary-general of the ICIS, said the organization`s preachers have promoted family planning for years, but have now largely taken the issue out of the mosque and focused efforts on publishing books on the issue.
"For our preaching in mosques, we now focus on topics such as maintaining tolerance, harmony and unity, as well as encouraging people to stay strong while facing disasters," he said.
UN Population Fund Asia Pacific Director Sultan A. Azis said the experience of several Muslim countries showed that biased cultural norms and the misinterpretation of religious teachings posed barriers to the implementation of population, gender and reproductive health programs. However, he said these problems could be overcome by improving the capacity of religious leaders by providing them necessary information and teaming them up with relevant policy-makers and program managers.
He said Muslim leaders have served as agents of change by speaking up about harmful traditional practices in Bangladesh and Nigeria, and are the driving force behind family planning programs in Iran, Egypt, Thailand, southern Philippines and Indonesia.
"In the face of a global rise in religious extremism, it is time to promote Muslim leadership in social and economic development, because development has been historically linked to peace and security," Azis said.
Source: www.muslimnews.co.uk (17 Apeil 2007)
