Prosecutors demand 2 years for 'Tempo' journalists
Prosecutors demand 2 years for 'Tempo' journalists
Evi Mariani, Jakarta
Prosecutors demanded on Monday that the court hand down two-year
prison sentences to Tempo journalist Ahmad Taufik and editor
Tengku Iskandar Ali for inciting public unrest and defaming
businessman Tomy Winata.
"I thought the prosecution would propose more lenient
sentences for us than for our chief editor, because, after all,
it is he who has the last word," Taufik joking after the hearing
while being hugged by Tempo chief editor Bambang Harymurti.
The prosecutors demanded the same sentence for Bambang on the
same charges in a separate hearing at the Central Jakarta
District Court last week.
The prosecutors also demanded the court take Taufik and
Iskandar Ali into custody immediately after sentencing.
Prosecutor Bastian Hutabarat old the court, presided over by
Judge Suripto, that both journalists wrote the article in
question and that it contained false information. The article was
published in the magazine's March 3, 2003 edition.
The prosecutors accused both defendants of publishing false
information that provoked people into attacking Tomy's Artha
Graha building on Jl. Pangeran Jayakarta, Central Jakarta.
They stated that the article had suggested Tomy was behind the
fire that destroyed parts of Tanah Abang market in February by
writing that the businessman had made a proposal to renovate the
market three months earlier.
The prosecutors insisted that the information was false
because Taufik could not produce evidence to prove otherwise.
The prosecution introduced information that could be damaging
for Taufik, that is, that he was sentenced to 31 months in prison
in 1995 for sowing hatred against the government by publishing an
underground paper called Independen.
Iskandar has been charged because it was he who added "big
scavenger" before Tomy's name. "Tomy Winata is not a big
scavenger, he is a businessman," said Hutabarat.
After the hearing, Tempo lawyer Todung Mulya Lubis regretted
that the prosecutors had not considered the Press Law when
presenting their conclusion.
"But had the prosecutors taken the Press Law into
consideration, Taufik and Iskandar would have not been tried in
the first place," he said.