After a year, where have they all gone?<\/p>\n
On June 21, 1994, the government revoked the publishing licenses
\nof Tempo, Editor and DeTik weeklies. A year has passed and a lot
\nhas happened. The following story, and four others on Page 3,
\nrecount the activities of the former employees of the three
\npublications, some of whom have sought to go their separate ways.<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Bowo, a former journalist of the defunct DeTik
\nnewspaper, tried his luck as a singer after the weekly was banned
\na year ago. He began singing songs composed by his former chief
\neditor, Eros Djarot.<\/p>\n
Eros was already an accomplished pop-song composer before he
\nentered the press business. His composition of the 70s, Badai
\nPasti Berlalu (The Tempest Will Be Over), for example, was made
\nthe theme song of a film of the period by leading director Teguh
\nKarya and has become an evergreen melody in Indonesia.<\/p>\n
Eros says that, thus far, no producer has been willing to
\nrelease his latest album because the lyrics are considered to be
\ntoo \"strong\", expressing what he and his colleagues felt in the
\nwake of the banning.<\/p>\n
\"There is another album containing songs about love and other
\nthings. I'm sure we will be able to start selling it in late
\nJuly,\" he said.<\/p>\n
Bowo and Eros are only two of scores of people displaced by
\nthe banning of the Tempo, DeTik and Editor newsweeklies. It has
\nbeen a year since the government revoked the licenses of the
\nthree publications. One year that has seen a lot of things:
\nanger, frustration, fear, the bitter breakup of friendships and
\nalso glimmers of hope, determination, courage, camaraderie,
\nstruggle and victory. Some of the year's events were
\nunprecedented in the history of the Indonesian press.<\/p>\n
Each of the three weeklies has its own post-banning story.
\nEditor, which the authorities said was banned for administrative
\nreasons -- the weekly was managed by people other than those
\nwhose names appeared in its permit -- seems to have had the
\nquietest time in the netherworld. Its former employees only
\ngained public attention on one occasion, when they launched a new
\nmagazine, Tiras, early this year.<\/p>\n
DeTik's afterlife has been more colorful. Considered the most
\ngutsy publication in the country before it was banned, the
\ntabloid, which managed to achieve a record circulation of 500,000
\nwithin a year of commencing publication, had its license snatched
\nby the government on the basis that its focus on political news
\nconflicted with its license to report on crime. Eros & Co. once
\ntried to make a comeback by penetrating the editorial board of
\nthe Simponi tabloid. However, they quickly pulled out after the
\ngovernment threatened to close that newspaper down. It seems the
\ntempest is not yet over for Eros & Co.<\/p>\n
\"I shall return,\" Eros quoted General MacArthur. \"But
\ncertainly not now, because the situation is not promising. There
\nare too many obstacles to creativity, too much fear and
\nsuspicion.\"<\/p>\n
Today Eros and colleagues spend time making songs, publishing
\nbooks, and writing poems. Some Eros' reporters -- mostly young
\npeople, some even students -- have gone back to college or joined
\nvarious local NGOs to fight for their cause.<\/p>\n
\"When DeTik was banned, I decided to continue my studies. I
\nwant to fulfill my mother's hope to see me wearing a toga,\" said
\nDadang Rachmat, 24, a former DeTik reporter, now a student of
\npolitical science at the National University in Jakarta.<\/p>\n
But journalism is still in his veins and one day he will make
\na comeback, he says.<\/p>\n
Tempo<\/p>\n
Tempo no doubt grabbed the most public attention. Founded in
\n1971, for more than two decades it was a must for the country's
\nmiddle class as well as Indonesia-watchers abroad. It also became
\nwell known as a factory for professional journalists. For Tempo's
\nformer staff, the past year has been a year of living graciously
\nand proudly, if bitterly and painfully. The magazine achieved
\nhistoric successes during its life and still, after its demise,
\nits people have managed to act in a way unprecedented in the
\nhistory of the press in Indonesia.<\/p>\n
Several weeks after Tempo's banning, 40 of its former
\njournalists and a number of non-editorial employees, including
\nfive office boys, who refused to join the Gatra magazine, set up
\na cooperative-like firm, PT Reksa Mitra Berjaya, and rented a
\nhouse in Tebet, South Jakarta, as their new base. They have come
\nto be known as the \"Tebet Group\".<\/p>\n
They refused to join Gatra, which was founded a couple of
\nweeks after the banning and is controlled by timber tycoon Bob
\nHasan, saying they suspected the editorial policy of the magazine
\nwould never be independent. About 70 percent of Tempo's former
\nemployees, mostly from the non-editorial sections, did join
\nGatra.<\/p>\n
Some of the uprooted reporters are working on a contract basis
\nfor the Sunday editions of the Media Indonesia and Sinar Pagi
\ndailies and act as consultants, paid and unpaid, for several
\npapers in Jakarta, including Neraca, and in the provinces. Others
\nwork for the SCTV private television station, production houses,
\nwork freelance for various print media or write books. One
\nphotographer has opened his own photo studio.<\/p>\n
They all donate between 25 and 40 percent of their earnings to
\nthe firm's treasury, which subsidizes former colleagues in need,
\nincluding Ahmad Taufik, a reporter who is now in prison for
\npublishing the Independen underground bulletin on behalf of the
\nAlliance of Independent Journalists, of which he is the
\npresident.<\/p>\n
Although they have been scattered all over the place, doing
\nvarious jobs, they all still cherish a dream: to return to what
\nTempo's former chief editor Goenawan Mohamad terms \"our promised
\nland.\"<\/p>\n
They are well aware that the road ahead is long and hard,
\ndespite their recent legal victory in the Jakarta Administrative
\nCourt.<\/p>\n
\"We are prepared to live this way for at least seven years,\"
\nsaid Bambang Harimurti, a Tempo journalist since 1982, who
\nrejected the label \"heroic\" for what he and his colleagues are
\ndoing. \"It's nothing unusual,\" he said.<\/p>\n
Split<\/p>\n
Sadly, the events of the past year have pitted journalist
\nagainst journalist to the point where reconciliation looks
\nimpossible.<\/p>\n
The move of 70 percent of the former workers, especially the
\njournalists, to Gatra is still a source of regret within the
\nTebet camp.<\/p>\n
Said Bambang: \"Had they not moved to Gatra, the government
\nwould have had no alternative but to allow Tempo to resume
\npublication, because the President himself had promised
\n(Australian Prime Minister) Keating to provide us with new jobs.
\nThus, with their move to Gatra, the government could excuse
\nitself by saying 'The jobs are there. Only, they don't want to
\ntake them.'\"<\/p>\n
Feeling uncomfortable with the hard stance adopted by the
\nTebet camp towards Gatra staff, some journalists left the Tebet
\ncamp and set up their own base in Prapanca, South Jakarta,
\ncalling themselves GET-plus (The Association of ex-Tempo's
\n-Plus). They argue that the antipathy towards Gatra staff is
\n\"undemocratic\".<\/p>\n
\"If we failed to dissuade them from joining Gatra, so what?
\nEveryone has the right to make his or her own choice. Willingness
\nto accept differences in principles is part of democracy. Didn't
\nTempo itself teach its people to be democratic?\" said Achmad
\nKurnia, 36, a member of GET-plus.<\/p>\n
Gatra staff, meanwhile, have refrained from launching counter-
\nattacks in words, preferring to concentrate on their work
\ninstead.<\/p>\n
\"We need to reassess the meaning of idealism,\" said Herry
\nKomar, 49, a Tempo reporter since its birth who is now Gatra's
\nchief editor. \"In my view, we also provide a voice for people's
\naspirations through this magazine.\" (Johannes Simbolon\/als)<\/p>",
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