His visits and dinners with Muslim hard-line clerics, however, reached a peak of controversy this week, with Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, the leader of the Jemaah Islamiyah regional terrorist group and the Muslim cleric alleged to be the ideological leader on an organization linked to al Qaida.
That exchange drew even more fire than one earlier in May, when Hamzah Haz visited the detained leader of the Laskar Jihad (Holy Warriors) Islamic militia, Jafar Umar Thalib, whose militia has fought to evict Christian from the sectarian-ravaged Moluccas islands. Thalib is being held for allegedly inciting a massacre of Christian villagers in Moluccas in late April.
Ba'asyir has been named by Singapore and Malaysia as a possible leader of a group that they say has ties with al Qaida network and was plotting attacks on U.S. targets in Singapore.
So why is the veep really doing this? Some speculate it is simply for political gain:
Haz, who leads Indonesia's largest Muslim political party that forms a key plank in the shaky coalition government, also denied any political motive... It was a "personal matter" to express sympathy among Muslims, he said.
A few days after the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington that left about 3,000 people dead, Haz told worshipers at a Jakarta mosque that the attacks "will cleanse the sins of the United States."
Critics and political experts criticized such talk, saying it could be considered by international communities to legitimate radicalism in the country amid issues of Megawati's weak in handling Muslim hard-liners.
Analysts expressed belief that Haz is just looking for supports from among Indonesian Muslims, including the militant groups to garner votes, as he is widely expected to vie for presidency during the country's next general elections, in 2004. But such a move could boomerang.
"Such a move can jeopardize Haz's political career once he has to face the international world," said a political analyst Afan Gaffar.
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