The emergence of various social media used to share information in real-time shows the development of communication system. According to research by We Are Social company, in 2016 88.1 million Indonesian people are internet users. Noticing the impacts of the development, Muhammadiyah Library and Information Council (MPI) conducted Muhammadiyah Netizen Gathering across Indonesia to confront challenges of this era.

Held on Saturday (19/8) at meeting hall of A.R. Fachruddin A, the gathering brought ‘network consolidation and development’ as the theme. The forum discussed efforts of Muhammadiyah to encounter this digital era and information technology development. “This gathering aims to establish a netizen consolidation forum of Muhammadiyah and formulate ethic codes of using social media and network development systems owned by Muhammadiyah,” explained Head of MPI PP Muhammadiyah Prof. Dr. Dadang Kahmad, M.Si.

In January 2017, 106 million Indonesian people are social media users. The data showed that a half of the Indonesia population employ social media as a communication tool. “Muhammadiyah has been established for more than a century and this movement cannot avert the implication and impacts of social media. Thus, Muhammadiyah has to adapt to this development. For instance, a case occurred to Ministry of Education Prof. Dr. Muhadjir Effendy. A lot of social media users attack him due to his policy. Muhammadiyah is supposed to utilize social media to assist him to create counter opinions,” declared Dadang.

“Besides, this forum also arranges programs and dakwah strategies of Muhammadiyah on social media. Nowadays, there are a lot of hoaxes which lead social media uses to debate one another. To overcome the circumstance, Muhammadiyah need provide rules of preaching on social media. Based on An-Nuur verse 1-10, we are requires to do tabayyun (finding truths) if we hear ambiguous news,” conveyed Dadang.

This forum also coined cyber army for Muhammadiyah netizen. The establishment of cyber army is to support Muhammadiyah to do tabayyun and not to fight back the negative news. Hence, what we do is creating counter opinions in order that the netizens can differentiate the truths and hoaxes,” he ended.

Additionally, along with the gathering, there was Kopdarnas Jarimu (Muhammadiyah Radio Network Gathering) at meeting hall of AR Fachruddin A of UMY.