Giving Workshop on Violence Extremism, Wahid Foundation Highlights the Importance of Prevention

Violence Extremism is one of the subjects given in the series of Women’s Access to Justice Workshop conducted by Wahid Foundation for three days on 18-21 June 2021. The workshop, which was held on The Margo Hotel, was attended by 30 representatives of Working Groups (Kelompok Kerja/Pokja) from Peace Villages in West Java (Tajurhalang, Pengasinan and Duren Seribu) and following strict health protocols.

Violence Extremism is chosen to be a subject in the Workshop due to the increasing trend of violence extremism shown by the survey conducted by Wahid Foundation for the last two decades. The workshop is also hoped to familiarize the Peace Village Pokja(s) to the notion of violence extremism that is on the rise. Furthermore, the lesson on violence extremism has been introduced to Peace Village Pokja(s) coached by Wahid Foundation as a share of participation to implement Presidential Regulation No. 7 Year 2021 about National Action Plan to Prevent and Countermeasure Violence-Based Extremism With Terrorism Tendency (Rencana Aksi Nasional Pencegahan dan Penanggulangan Ekstremisme Berbasis Kekerasan yang Mengarah pada Terorisme/ RAN PE).

This activity received high enthusiasm from the attendees. Fadil Muhammad, one of the attendees from Pokja of Tajurhalang Village stated that he received many new insights regarding violence extremism, radicalism, and intolerance. He also added that under many circumstances, the three words or phrases have been only interpreted as violence, while there are many fundamental differences between them. “When people hear the word “radical” or “extreme”, they will jump to conclude that the words mean violence and going astray, when actually there are much more than those two,” said Fadil.

 The speaker for this workshop, Alamsyah M Djafar, who is a Senior Researcher of The Wahid Foundation, explained, “not every person who does violence is radical, as radicalism is triggered by faith, ideology and secular things. For example, a group invites to do violence by teaching certain ideology. Meanwhile, violence extremism can be seen as something that is against the mainstream idea. When a person forces their desire with violence, it will be a form of violence extremism. Extremism cannot be limited to so long as an action is not done with violence, as it will violate freedom of expression. Regarding intolerance, it will be relevant when there are two keywords: difference and dislike. Being tolerant means respecting basic rights. When there are no differences, tolerance will not be needed, as tolerance will occur when there are differences,” Alam concluded.

Through the given lesson on violence extremism, Wahid Foundation hopes the Peace Village Pokja(s) will be able to detect and prevent the practices of violence extremism on their regions.