ANTARA to Steer Astacita Narrative in 2026 News Performance

The performance of national news agency ANTARA’s reporting in 2026 will generally focus on steering the Astacita narrative pursued by President Prabowo Subianto, its CEO Benny Siga Butarbutar has announced. He explained that the Astacita narrative guiding the news performance is divided into three thematic frameworks: economic aspects; politics, law and security; and human development and culture. “The mandate we have received is to ensure all our reporting is educational, empowering and enlightening, and embodies nationalist values,” Benny said during a hearing with House of Representatives Commission VII at the parliamentary complex in Jakarta on Tuesday. According to him, the news themes raised include food security, food self-sufficiency, village cooperatives, and energy, as well as bureaucratic reform, corruption eradication, national resilience and other matters. “This is to build a counterbalance against the massive attacks on the government on social media and also in homeless media,” he said. He therefore requested the support of Commission VII for the acceleration that ANTARA will undertake, as is common for news agencies. Furthermore, he revealed that ANTARA will reopen overseas bureaux, which requires greater support. “We need support in order to accelerate cash flow and also financial mitigation, as well as the digitalisation we have implemented,” Benny said.