Govt asks media to jointly outline rules
Kurniawan Hari The Jakarta Post Jakarta
The government has called on media organizations to sit down with government officials to formulate regulations necessary to create what it calls as responsible media.
State Minister of Communications and Information Syamsul Mu'arif said here on Wednesday that "irresponsible" acts by certain media outfits had prompted the public at large to take the law into their own hands.
"We have to create a regulation that can develop a national media with specific character," Syamsul said when opening a seminar titled Media Responsibility in Creating National Culture on Wednesday.
More and more media organizations were publishing and broadcasting pornographic and racist news articles and pictures, he said.
The minister did not mention those that had deliberately disseminated pornographic and racist articles or pictures, but the Indonesian Council of Ulemas (MUI) pointed out earlier that state-owned TV station TVRI's Dansa yo Dansa, private station SCTV's Majalah X, and Metro TV's Life and Love contained suggestive content.
The Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Ministry of National Education are currently drafting an anti-pornography bill.
Airing or publishing material deemed offensive could get suspects charged under Article 282 of the Criminal Code pertaining to decency standards.
The government had planned to limit the number of non- professional mass media by imposing dozens of articles in the Criminal Code, which could bring the press under control, and curtail the incidence of racy pictures and material, character assassination, unlawful ads and bogus journalists (those who pretend to be journalists to extort money).
Minister Syamsul warned in March that the government would take stiff measures against the broadcasting or publication of sexually suggestive images.
"Law enforcers will take strict action (against media publishing or airing sexually suggestive material). The government is therefore issuing a warning in advance. Action will be taken by law enforcers (police)," he said earlier.
Syamsul said on Wednesday that the regulation would not curtail press freedom, but harness and protect the national media's function in education, national unity, culture and public interest.
Syamsul said that the regulations to be imposed on the professional media would be discussed by journalists, academics, and social observers.
Meanwhile, senior journalist Djafar Assegaff said that the national media should carry out its freedom responsibly.
Citing Code of Ethics of the American Society of Newspaper Editors (1923), a statement of principles of the American Society of Newspaper Editors (1975), and Sigma Delta Chi (1973), Djafar said that all of them put responsibility as the top priority for newspapers to comply with.
Media observer Sasa Djuarsa of the University of Indonesia said that the increasing number of feisty media publications that showed racy pictures was normal in the reform era because it had been under the full control of repressive governments since independence.
"The people are smart enough now to make a selection," said Sasa, expressing optimism that the people at large would not be easily duped by smear campaigns.