Indonesia Is Pushed to Ban Alcohol for Health of Bodies, if Not Souls (Excerpt)

Source: New York Times

By JOE COCHRANE

SEPT. 2, 2016

I.B. Agung Partha foresees an apocalypse, as he put it, on the Indonesian resort island of Bali.

The threat is not a plague of locusts, nor one of Bali’s dormant volcanos springing to life. It is in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital several hundred miles away, where Parliament is debating legislation that would ban beer, wine and spirits across the thousands of islands that make up this country.

For Bali, whose beaches, lush landscapes and cultural attractions drew four million visitors last year, the effect would be something like the end of the world, said Mr. Partha, the chairman of the Bali Tourism Board.

“Hotels have bars, restaurants have bars, and they serve alcohol – this is just part of tourism,” he said. “This bill is just no good.”

Alcohol bans have been proposed before in Indonesia, by the same Islamic political parties that are pushing the current bill. Their scripture-based arguments gained little traction in Indonesia’s multifaith society, which is mostly Muslim but has a secular government.

But this time, those parties have taken a new line: that alcohol should be banned for health reasons, not religious reasons. And a passive response to the legislation by Indonesia’s dominant secular parties, which could have quashed it months ago, has some worried that it could become law.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/03/world/asia/indonesia-bali-alcohol-ban-bill.html?_r=0