Slander suspect regrets remark

JAKARTA (JP): A Ministry of Religious Affairs official who is being tried for slander expressed regret in court yesterday for making a statement which the predominantly Christian Toraja community in South Sulawesi found offensive.

The official, a public relations chief of the ministry's office in South Sulawesi, said during cross-examination at the Central Jakarta District Court that he had not intended to offend anyone when he alleged that young women in Toraja were promiscuous.

His remarks, printed in the Pelita daily in April, prompted massive protests against the official and the newspaper in Makale (capital of Toraja regency), Ujungpandang and in Jakarta.

The prosecutor said the statement degraded a particular religious community in South Sulawesi. If found guilty, the defendant could be jailed for up to five years.

The 44-year-old defendant said he had asked the Pelita reporter not to print his statement, because it was an unsubstantiated allegation which he had first heard from a South Sulawesi school teacher.

The official reportedly made the statement to the reporter after taking part in a seminar in Jakarta on ways of containing the spread of the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).

He admitted yesterday that during the seminar he raised concerns about the widespread sales and use of condoms in Toraja.

The defendant also told the court that he had attempted to apologize over the incident, but was prevented from doing so by some police officers.

He recalled that as soon as the controversy broke out, while he was still in Jakarta, he drafted a letter explaining his position as well as expressing regret to the Torajan people.

But as he was about to make copies at a photocopying store for the Toraja legislative council, South Sulawesi governor and the local office of the Ministry of Religious Affairs, the letter was seized by two visiting police officers from South Sulawesi.

Unfortunately neither the police nor the prosecutors acknowledged the existence of the letter, he said, stressing its importance as a mitigating factor.

The prosecutor last week presented depositions from 12 women and one young man from Toraja, all refuting the suggestion that young Torajans are sexually promiscuous, especially with foreign visitors.

Presiding judge Asmar Ismail adjourned the trial until Tuesday to hear the prosecutor's sentencing demand. (16)