Govt told to quickly rescue `TVRI'

Govt told to quickly rescue `TVRI'

Evi Mariani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Members of the House of Representatives (DPR) urged the
government on Monday to rescue state-owned television station
TVRI from bankruptcy, arguing that the state needed public
television.

"I feel really sad knowing that TVRI is on the brink of
bankruptcy. It's an emergency situation that the government must
deal with quickly," member of House Commission I for
communication and information affairs Djoko Susilo told The
Jakarta Post.

Fellow Commission I member Paulus Widiyanto urged the Office
of the State Minister of State Enterprises to complete TVRI's
corporate transition process straight away.

He also told local administrations to help finance TVRI's
stations in their respective provinces.

The government decided in April 2002 to change TVRI from a
social service corporation to a limited liability company. As a
result, TVRI would no longer receive funds directly from the
state budget but through the Office of the State Minister of
State Enterprises (BUMN), after completing the process to become
a company, which included letting the office appoint TVRI's board
of directors.

However, the office has not thus far completed that task,
while the Ministry of Finance has stopped allocating funds to
TVRI.

Consequently, several TVRI stations in provinces such as
Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam, Lampung, Bengkulu and Central
Kalimantan stopped operating since last October, while stations
in Central Java, North Sumatra and West Sumatra are all on the
verge of bankruptcy.

Djoko said that his commission had discussed steps to urge the
government to inject funds to rescue TVRI. "We've been
formulating a letter to the Minister of Finance, urging him to
disburse money from the reserve funds in the state budget."

Ade Armando, a lecturer at the University of Indonesia's
communications department, voiced a similar opinion.

"Every country should have its own public television that is
financially supported by the government. Such public television
should convey, unlike TVRI's disappointing current market-
oriented programs, educational and cultural programs," Ade said.

He cited countries in Western Europe as examples. "They
allocate money for public television stations from revenue
sources such as TV and radio taxes, sponsorships from companies
and donations," he said.

As for TVRI, he acknowledged that the state could not be the
sole source of funds, while citizens were reluctant to make any
contributions because TVRI's programs were not popular.

"So, as stipulated in the Broadcasting Law, commercials could
be one of TVRI's sources of finance, besides donations and the
state budget," he said.

Although he supported the existence of TVRI as public
television, he said that TVRI should change its programs to
something educational.

"TVRI should provide the benchmark for good television
programs, while KPI should be the one that monitors the quality
of its programs," said Ade, referring to the Indonesian
Broadcasting Committee.