MISPI and Islamic law

This section will discuss how MISPI has responded to the implementation of Islamic law. Syarifah believes that most Acehnese accept the rights of Aceh to implement Islamic law. She mentioned, for example, the overwhelming response of the Acehnese when Aceh was granted the rights to implement sharia law in 1999.²⁰ According to her, this was because many Acehnese believe that they have already been living under sharia principles anyway, even if they were not legally formalized.

Like other local women activists, Syarifah has criticized discriminatory practices that have occurred in the course of the implementation of Islamic law. However, she always seeks to make it clear that her criticism should not be understood as a rejection of Islamic law being implemented in Aceh.²¹ In her view, if there are criticisms of the implementation of Islamic law in Aceh, they should be addressed to government institutions, and not directed against sharia or Islam per se.

According to Syarifah, the problems and disputes that have recently emerged and which have led to a heated discussion on the implementation of Islamic law are the result of a number of factors. First, many Acehnese have different perspectives on how sharia should be interpreted and expressed in the Qanun. Second, Qanun that regulate Acehnese religiosity are based only on the interpretation by legal authorities and the Ulama of the sacred texts. Third, women were not consulted during the process of interpreting sharia and drafting the Qanun, so the Qanun becomes insufficiently gender-sensitive. Fourth, the way Qanun is being implemented has not been appropriately supported by government institutions.

Syarifah offers several approaches that should be considered in an attempt to address the above matters. First, there is a serious need for Acehnese Ulama, academics, policy-makers, and civil society activists to go back to the sources of Islamic law, to reread and reinterpret sharia in the context of Aceh. In the process of rereading the Islamic texts women must be included.

In response to the implementation of Islamic law, MISPI argues, it needs to be improved in three ways. First, at the institutional government level, MISPI attempts to convince the local government that the current Qanun need to be reformulated, because they have not led to justice, as had been expected. Second, MISPI considers it important for women and women’s activists to work with religious communities, most importantly with Dayah (Islamic traditional educational institutions) and the Ulama, in particular the female Ulama, and with academics. Third, MISPI believes that in order for the first two strategies to be successful, it needs to promote a rereading of the sources of Islamic law to uncover the egalitarian messages of Islam that MISPI members see as contained in the Qur’an, Sunna and Hadith. MISPI believes if this can be better promoted in patriarchal Acehnese society, women will have better access to equality and will not be the subject of discriminatory religious and social practices. In carrying out its programmes, MISPI needs to continue to work with both national and international partners. MISPI also acknowledges the need for women’s NGOs and women activists to collaborate with Muslim intellectuals.