Accused Of Comparing The Sound Of The Azan With Barking, Roy Suryo Refuses To Bother Responding

Roy Suryo (Capture Twitter @KRMTRoySuryo2)

JAKARTA - Former Minister of Youth and Sports (Menpora) Roy Suryo opened his voice after being criticized by the Executive Director of the Legal Mafia Eradication Committee (KPMH) Muannas Alaidid.

Muannas said that it was not the Minister of Religion (Menag) Yaqut Cholil Qoumas who compared the sound of the call to prayer with the sound of barking dogs but Roy Suryo himself.

"Ha ha ha... You don't have to worry about responding to these comments," said Roy when contacted by VOI via electronic message, Thursday, February 24.

When asked further the reason for his reluctance to provide a rebuttal or response to Muannas' statement, Roy has not explained it in detail.

Muannas' accusations stemmed from Roy Suryo's upload on his Twitter account, @KRMTRoySuryo2. Roy uploaded a snippet of Menag Yaqut's statement with a short duration of 34 seconds.

"The simplest thing is, if we live in a complex, for example. Left, right, front and back all keep dogs. For example, barking at the same time, are we disturbed or not? What does this mean? we have to arrange it so that it doesn't become a disturbance. Speakers in musalas are welcome to use, but please set them so that they are not disturbed," reads a snippet of the Minister of Religion's statement in the video uploaded by Roy Suryo on Twitter @KRMTRoySuryo2.

In the video description, Roy said that this video is authentic evidence, 100 percent original without engineering or editing. He also emphasized in his tweet that Minister of Religion Yaqut clearly said the words 'dog' and 'barking.'

"At first I thought this was just a media "clickbait" (to get attention only). But when media like Detik, Tribun, Liputan 6 wrote the same thing, Is it appropriate for the voice of the Muadzin - who utters the Adhan, the call to prayer - to be compared to barking Dog? AMBYAR," said Roy.

According to Muannas, there was no statement from the Minister of Religion Yaqut that compared the sound of the call to prayer with the barking of a dog. "It is clear that the comparison between the call to prayer and the sound of the dog is Si Roy Suryo, not Minister of Religion Gus @YaqutCQoumas," said Muannas via tweet on his Twitter account, @muannas_Alaidid quoted by VOI, Thursday, February 24.

According to Muannas, the duration of this video has been cut so that the message that Minister Yaqut wants to convey is blurry. In essence, Muannas emphasized, the Minister of Religion only wanted to adjust the loudspeakers.

"In that interview, even though you manipulated it by cutting the duration, it was clear that it only gave an example of the importance of regulating loudspeaker noise, it was proven that there was absolutely no mention of the call to prayer, which was recorded in full video," said Muannas.

A similar criticism was conveyed by Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) activist Mohamad Guntur Romli or Gun Romli. From the news attached by Roy Suryo, none of them compare the sound of the call to prayer with the barking of a dog.

"From the attached news titles, there is nothing "Comparing the sound of the call to prayer with the barking of dogs" nor is there a sentence to the call to prayer in the statement of the Minister of Religion, so the one who compares the call to prayer with barking dogs is Roy Suryo himself!" Gun Romli.

Gun Romli also presented a complete video description from the Minister of Religion Yaqut. Here's the content,

"Because we know, for example, in areas where the majority of Muslims are. Almost every 100-200 meters there are mosques. Imagine if at the same time they lit the Toa together at the top. That is no longer a symbol, but a disturbance for the surroundings," said Minister of Yaqut.

"Let's imagine again, I'm Muslim, I live in a non-Muslim environment. Then the house of worship for our non-Muslim brothers and sisters turn on Toa five times a day with loud bangs, that's how it feels," said Yaqut again.

He then gave an example of other sounds that could cause disturbance. One of them is the sound of a dog barking.

"The simplest thing is, if we live in a complex, for example. Left, right, front and back, all keep dogs. For example, barking at the same time, are we disturbed or not? What do these sounds mean? we arrange it so that it does not become a disturbance. Speakers in the mosques are welcome to use, but please arrange them so that they are not disturbed," said Minister of Religion Yaqut.