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JAKARTA -- It was just two years ago when Indonesian strongman Suharto stepped down amid a wave of street protests, after more than three decades in power. But today, Indonesia is a country transformed. Despite military unrest and ethnic tensions, a democratic government is firmly in place. The plunder and other abuses committed by the past regime are being investigated. Citizens are speaking out freely and demonstrations are regular fare. There are few more dramatic indicators of how things have changed than the Indonesian media. A visitor from Manila would feel very much at home in Jakarta, where there is not only a wide choice of feisty newspapers, but also a cacophony of voices blaring from radio and television. Since May 1998, over 1,000 new press licenses - four times more than that issued by the Suharto government - have been given out under relaxed licensing rules. Private radio stations are now allowed to broadcast their own news programs, a great leap from the past when they could only air news from state-owned Radio Republik Indonesia (RRI). Censorship of television news was abolished, and last year, even the Information Ministry itself was dismantled and thrown into the dustbin. As in the Philippines after the fall of Marcos in 1986, the new freedoms are a heady brew. But as in the Philippines, cynicism of, and disillusionment about, the media are now setting in, replacing the euphoria with which both journalists and the general public embraced press freedom. This disaffection is most evident in the unruly crowds that have massed up in broadcast stations and newspaper offices, demanding immediate redress for what they perceived as affronts. Since January, the protesters that have vented their ire on news organizations range from Islamic militants to pro-independence groups, to even a group of irate bus drivers who staged a demonstration over a Bandung newspaper's report that alleged they did not have public transport licenses. This free-for-all can be explained partly as outbursts of excess energies let loose by the wave of democracy that has swept this diverse archipelago of over 200 million people. And there are those who think that the exuberance will pass once the novelty of an unfettered press wears off. "When press freedom came into the open, many things that had been kept shut were also opened," said Masdar F. Mas'udi, a leader of the Nahdlatul Ulama, a moderate Islamic organization once chaired by Abdurrahman Wahid, who was elected president last year. "The overreaction from the public would not last long," Mas'udi predicted in a program broadcast by Radio 68H on May 2. "There will soon be a balance between public reaction and press reporting." Yet such a seemingly liberal stance is deceiving. Just four days after Mas'udi made this remark, dozens of members of the Nahdlatul Ulama's civilian guard called Banser occupied the office of the Jawa Pos in Surubaya, East Java, to protest articles accusing top leaders of their organization of corruption. To end the occupation - in which Banser members were switching off computers and disconnecting phone lines - the newspaper agreed to publish a retraction and apology and to donate $4.4 million for the construction of a mosque. Press groups in Indonesia are understandably worried that unless law enforcement agencies are able to protect the media, other groups will be encouraged to take the same vigilante approach. As it is, the press has been especially hurt not only by assaults by Islamic groups but also of separatist movements fighting for independence from Jakarta. On January 28, for example, the pro-independence militia group Satuan Tugas attacked the office of state-owned RRI in Fakfak, West Papua when they were not allowed to issue a statement on air. The militiamen destroyed buildings and equipment, paralyzing the radio station for four days, reported the Jakarta office of the Southeast Asian Press Alliance (Seapa). Three weeks later, on February 16, several hundred militiamen armed with knives, bows and swords destroyed the building of the RRI office in the West Papuan town of Merauke. The militiamen perceived the radio station as biased in favor of the district government, which opposes independence. According to Seapa-Jakarta, the station was so devastated by the attack that it had to suspend broadcasting for a week. THE IRONY is that these attacks are taking place when there is a government that supports press freedom, and after the passage of a new press law that provides far greater protection for journalists than there ever was in the past. Only nine months old, this law removed the strict licensing and other rules imposed by the Suharto regime and provided for the creation of an independent Press Council that would shield the press from outside forces and provide mechanisms to settle public grievances against the media. The President, like many other officials, appreciates the importance of a free press, even if he himself has been the subject of critical reporting. "Press freedom is important in Indonesia where we are undergoing profound changes and achieving real democracy for the first time," Wahid told journalists in a celebration of World Press Freedom Day in Jakarta last May. "In its early development, the Indonesian press needs protection as well as professionalism. We have to guarantee freedom of the press against the many forces that think freedom is not necessary." The problem, however, is that while officials acknowledge the need to protect the media, a weak state and feeble institutions - such as corrupt courts and ineffective law-enforcement agencies - are unable to ensure that journalists are shielded from attacks. In late February, for example, 300 members of the self-styled Youth Islamic Front of Surukarta trooped to the office of the PTPN Sasitania radio station in Solo, Central Java to protest the airing of a program that tackled religious conflict. The protesters claimed that the station aired views that insulted Islam, and demanded that it broadcast an apology five times daily for a full week. They also asked the police to seize the station's equipment as evidence to back up their charges, and the authorities obliged. The station was off the air for three days as a result. Press groups like the Alliance of Independent Journalists and Seapa-Jakarta fault the police for being unable to mediate between angry crowds and besieged journalists and to defend the media against such assaults. But they also blame the protesters for resorting to extreme measures to air their grievances. For the protesters, particularly Islamic radicals who have been the noisiest in denouncing what they deem are media excesses, the street actions achieve the desired results. As Al Habib Muhammad Rizieq Syihab, leader of a group that calls itself the Islamic Defenders Front, said in a recent press forum: "If we go through the normal way of seeking redress, it will be a long process, and we do not get more than a few lines in the corner of a newspaper." "Press reports provoke public outrage," said Syihab, "and the press itself is arrogant and know-it-all." JOURNALISTS themselves are the first to admit that the Indonesian press has sometimes abused its freedom. They even say that some of the anger against the press is justified. Observes Aristides Katoppo, a senior Indonesian journalist: "Many in the press do not distinguish between fact and fiction, between news and opinion, or between rumor or gossip and news."
The story was based on what the editor, Hoessein Madilis, claimed was a conversation he had some years ago with the widow, who told him the story of the alleged love triangle. None of the widow's supposed lovers were interviewed for the story; neither did the widow, who has not been found, corroborate the article. Last August, Madilis was sentenced to six months in jail for publishing a false report. Incidents such as this damage the credibility of a press that has won acclaim for its role in defying the strictures of dictatorship to report the abuses of the Suharto regime and the gains made by the democracy movement. While Indonesia boasts of high-quality publications that can rival the best in Southeast Asia, the liberalization of the press has resulted in the proliferation of third-rate publications that compete in a crowded market by offering sleaze and sensation. Professional growth is also hampered by other constraints, including low salaries (40 percent of journalists earn about $70 a month), corruption and lack of training. The concern of some senior journalists therefore is not so much angry citizens but the threat to the freedom - and viability - of the press from within its own ranks. "This sense of indifference, of routine, of mediocre work, this is the enemy internally," says Jakob Oetama, chief executive of Kompas, Indonesia's biggest newspaper. "Self criticism is important, so is professional competence." To the Indonesian media's credit, such self-reflection is taking place in many newsrooms across the country. Two years may be a long time to sustain euphoria, but it is enough time to realize that freedom does not automatically bring about a professional and responsible press. Filipino journalists, who have been grappling with these issues for 14 years, know only too well that freedom brings with it a new set of problems and challenges. While no unruly crowds have so far occupied newspapers in the Philippines, 33 Filipino journalists have been killed, many of them for their reporting, since 1986. In both the Philippines and Indonesia, the loosening of state controls liberalized the press, but it has also emboldened individuals and groups that have resorted to extra-legal means to silence journalists. No one contests that raising professional and ethical standards is key. But the media has to be supported by other institutions. The State has to provide protection for journalists, and the courts and the police must be able to defend a free press, no matter its excesses. In Indonesia, "the problem is that the courts and the justice system are not independent," says Leo Batubara, secretary-general of the Newspaper Publishers Association. "When conflict with the press occurs and the public feels disadvantaged, there is no mechanism to resolve disputes. Without an independent court system, we would have more and more members of the public take the law into their own hands." Sheila Coronel is the Executive Director of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism and a founding Board Member of SEAPA. |
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After the Euphoria