Pesantren community urges media to be more carefully

Bogor, NU Online
Pesanten community has urged newsmen to be more carefully in doing their professional tasks because recently press has been unfair for relating terrorism acts to pesantren.

The alumnus of Pesantren Daarul Rahman, Leuwisadeng subdistrict, Bogor regency, Abdul Halim Yahya, made the remarks recently.<>

Abdul Halim was deeply concerned about the developing public opinion following the bomb explosion at JW Marriot and Ritz Carlton hotels last month, saying some mass media had openly attacked pesantren for being considered to have involved in the terror acts.

"I read everyday, there have always been reports or television programs relating terrorism topesantren. This is is an act cannot be corrected either with logic or with whatever reason for not reflecting the real reality," Halim said.

He was of the opinion that efforts to relate terrorism to pesantren were reckless acts absolutelly opposed to reason. In fact, he argued, there were no pesantren curriculum which are wrong; there were no pesantren involving themselves in any terrorist act.

In terms of some terrorists having ever studied in certain pesantren, Abdul Halim said that they could not be regarded to have represented pesantren community as a whole.

"If there were alumni of a certain pesantren involved (in terrorism acts), all that cannot be used as standard to do generalization," he said.