Reflecting On Cases In Surabaya, BNPT: Radicalism Of Women And Children Starting From Family

Screenshot - BNPT Main Secretary Bangbang Surono at the BNPT Bakohumas Thematic Forum monitored online in Jakarta, Thursday (5/9/2024). (ANTARA/YouTube/Humas BNPT/Agatha Olivia Victoria)

JAKARTA - The National Counterterrorism Agency (BNPT) revealed that exposure to the ideology of radicalism and terrorism against women and children started from the family environment.

BNPT President Secretary Bangbang Surono said this was reflected in the suicide bombing case of two families in Surabaya in 2018, involving two pairs of husband and wife and their children in the near future.

"The attack was the first to involve the family as perpetrators. This only happened in Indonesia, abroad there were no terrorists involving small children," said Bangbang at the BNPT Bakohumas Thematic Forum which was monitored online in Jakarta, Thursday, September 5, which was confiscated by Antara.

He revealed that based on research from I-Khub Outlook BNPT 2023, there are three groups that are vulnerable to the radicalization process, namely women, children, and adolescents.

Therefore, BNPT currently has various programs that focus on forming household strength or family resilience against radicalism and terrorism in order to prevent the exposure of women and children to this ideology.

According to Bangbang, if at the smallest level, namely family, a person's resilience is strong, then this will affect his resilience in exposure to radicalism at the public level (public resilience) and national resilience).

He said that several BNPT programs that are currently and have been running in forming family strengths against radicalism and terrorism include cooperation agreements with the Ministry of Women's Empowerment and Child Protection (KemenPPPA) in terms of countering criminal acts of terrorism for women and children.

The scope of the cooperation consists of the implementation of community empowerment programs, handling in special protection for children victims of terrorism networks, increasing resource capacity, to exchanging data and information.

In addition, he continued, there are also activities to prevent radicalism with the SMART model (International Healthy Smart and Tough Families), which aim to increase public awareness and understanding of the dangers of radicalism and the importance of the role of families in preventing the spread of radicalism.

Bangbang hopes that through these various programs, the community, especially women, children, and adolescents, will be able to have the durability and durability of exposure to ideologies that are not in accordance with Pancasila.

"No matter how strong the ideology of violence tries to infiltrate the Indonesian nation, if the people, especially the younger generation, already have a good understanding of the ideology of their nation, they will definitely be strong or survive," he said.