Benar News reported that a survey released on October 30, 2017 showed about a fourth of Indonesia’s college students support fighting for the implementation of an Islamic caliphate system in Indonesia. Jakarta-based Alvara Research Center and Mata Air Foundation polled 1,800 students from 25 leading universities in Indonesia plus 2,400 high school students from across Indonesia to determine if early detection of radicalism among campus populations could predict Indonesia’s future.
The survey, conducted from Sept. 1 to Oct. 5, revealed that 17.8 percent of university students and 18.3 percent of high school students preferred the concept of a caliphate ruled by a Muslim spiritual leader over Indonesia’s current republic. A similar number of students preferred Islam over the official Pancasila foundation of five principles as the state ideology. Pancasila espouses unity in diversity along with democracy and social justice.
The university and high school students also preferred sharia law at the local level, by 21.9 percent and 19.6 percent, respectively.
The survey also found that 29.5 percent of university students and 29.7 percent of high school students did not want non-Muslim leaders to govern in Indonesia. The survey had a margin of error of 2.35 percent for college students and 2 percent for the high school students.
The survey seems to reveal an increase in intolerance among students. A similar 2009 survey showed that the concept of a caliphate was acceptable to less than 12 percent of respondents.
In the 2010 Indonesian census, 87.18% of Indonesians identified themselves as Muslim and 9.87% identified as Christian, either Protestant or Catholic.
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