Jakarta. Muhaimin Iskandar has been commanding the National Awakening Party (PKB) for nearly two decades with a centralistic leadership style, a former aide said recently.

The remarks by former PKB Secretary-General Muhammad Lukman Edy were delivered during an interview with Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), further signaling the escalating tension between the country’s biggest Muslim organization and the political party it founded in 1998.

The NU leadership board has been irked by recent moves from Muhaimin, who contested the presidential election as a running mate without consulting the organization and, as a lawmaker, initiated a House of Representatives’ inquiry committee into the government’s handling of the last Hajj pilgrimage.

"I just told the NU leadership board that Cak Imin has been at the helm of PKB for too long. It’s been 19 years now," Lukman said after the interview at NU’s headquarters in Central Jakarta on Wednesday, using Muhaimin’s nickname.

According to him, Muhaimin imposed a centralistic leadership style by overlooking the role of the advisory board, which comprises prominent clerics, in making key decisions and the party’s budget.

During the PKB congress in Bali in 2019, Muhaimin’s team formally stripped the advisory board of most of its authority, said Lukman, a former rural development minister.

"Fundamentally, the advisory board is non-existent in PKB’s budget and administrative guidance," Lukman said.

The absence of an effective advisory board causes decision-making power to be centralized in Muhaimin, he added.

"The manifesto from the Bali congress explicitly grants extraordinary power to the party chairman," Lukman said.

During the interview, Lukman presented two documents of the PKB’s manifesto produced before and after the Bali congress.

“To be honest, the most substantial issue inside PKB is the lack of transparency and accountability in its financial management, which covers faction budget and election funds,” Lukman said.

“There is no audit, no accountability report to constituents. In today’s PKB, the financial condition is kept strictly confidential so that nobody can ask any questions about it.”

Separately, PKB Deputy Chairman Jazilul Fawaid accused Lukman of creating divisions in the party and confirmed that he is no longer a party member, so Lukman has no capacity to speak on the party’s behalf.

Earlier, NU Chairman Yahya Cholil Staquf alleged that Muhaimin is getting personal and targeting him and his younger brother, Religious Affairs Minister Yaqut Cholil Qoumas, whose office organizes the Hajj pilgrimage.

Muhaimin became the PKB chairman in 2005 and has since survived numerous attempts to dethrone him, including by Yenny Wahid, the daughter of the late President Abdurrahman Wahid, the founder of PKB.

Under Muhaimin, PKB emerged as the fourth-largest political party in the House of Representatives based on results from the last election. PKB also became the largest Muslim-based party, while a fellow Islamic party, the United Development Party (PPP), was eliminated from the national legislature due to poor election performance.

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