Jakarta Governor Urges Alexis Workers to Find Jobs in Sharia-Compliant Hotels

Jakarta, MINA – Sharia accommodation is in the headlines in Indonesia this week after Jakarta’s new Governor shut down the city’s best-known brothel and urged its workers to get new jobs in Sharia hotels.

At the reception desk of a Sharia hotel in Jakarta, religion is on show. Guests are checked in by young women wearing matching purple jilbabs that fall across the shoulders of their black jackets.

There is a collection box for the local mosque in a corner of the lobby, and the hotel’s mission statement is fastened to an adjacent wall, making it clear this is a “halal hotel”.

The front desk staff of the Hotel Sofyan are trained to catch out any couples who look like breaching the hotel’s adherence to sharia law.

“If they are not married, they cannot stay here,” radioaustralia.net.au quoted Asep, one of the front desk staff, as explaining.

Unmarried couples are not welcome.

Sharia is the Islamic religious code that mandates — among other things — modest clothing and behaviour.

In Indonesia’s Aceh province, offences against Sharia, such as sex before marriage or gay sex, are punishable with jail and public caning.

Jakarta has no such rules, but a Sharia hotel is free to refuse to check-in couples who are not married.

“We don’t have a proper regulation saying that you must bring your marriage certificate,” Asep said.

“So we can see it from their body language.”

In particular “their behaviour, shyness, awkwardness, you can see it if they are married,” he added.

It is not just hotels that enforce Sharia codes.

Online Airbnb-style room rental sites like Zen Rooms often carry ads with the word “Syariah” (Sharia) that means unmarried couples are not welcome.

A screengrab of a zen room advertisement with the word Syariah. (T/RS5/RS1)

Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)