'Tempo' stories did not disturb stability: Fikri
'Tempo' stories did not disturb stability: Fikri
JAKARTA (JP): The former Deputy Chief Editor of Tempo magazine
said yesterday that the news weekly did not disturb national
stability as claimed by the government to justify its decision in
banning it last year.
Fikri Jufri made the remarks when testifying in a hearing at
the Jakarta State Administrative Court on two lawsuits against
Minister of Information Harmoko's decision to revoke the
magazine's publishing license.
One lawsuit was filed by Goenawan Mohamad, Tempo's former
chief editor, and the other by the magazine's former employees.
"It was not true that news carried by Tempo had disturbed
either national stability, security, or order," he said in
response to Chief Judge Benjamin Mangkoedilaga's questions.
He said that the magazine editors had never received any
complaints for either the subjects or the objects of some news
items run by Tempo.
He cited an example of the article Drama Berdarah di Jalan By
Pass (Bloody drama on the By Pass Road) published in Tempo's 40th
edition on Dec. 2, 1989, about the murder of a Jakarta police
officer who had an affair. Tempo got a warning from Harmoko for
running the story.
"We never received any complaints from the Ministry of Defense
and Security or the Armed Forces headquarters regarding the
contents of the article," he said.
Goenawan and the magazine's former employees were represented
by four of their lawyers, Adnan Buyung Nasution, Trimoelja D.
Soerjadi, Todung Mulya Lubis and Atmajaya Salim, while Harmoko
was represented by all of his lawyers, led by R. Wiyono.
Tempo was closed down in June last year. The Ministry of
Information said the magazine repeatedly ignored warnings from
the government about its editorial content.
Currently, Harmoko's decision is being challenged by four
distinct lawsuits from former Tempo editors, employees and
readers. Two suits were filed at the administrative court and two
at the Central Jakarta District Court. All suits oppose the
validity of the minister's decision to revoke Tempo's license.
Tempo's former employees have been split. One group of
employees has obtained a license to publish the new magazine
called Gatra, which is financed by timber tycoon Mohammad (Bob)
Hasan. Others have taken part-time jobs in Jakarta-based
newspapers, while some others are still waiting for a publishing
license of a new magazine.
Fikri said that their news had always been in line with the
government's guidelines for news writing and reporting.
He said all members of the editorial board, who were in charge
of the articles to be published, had the journalist's code of
ethics and news reporting guidelines.
The editorial board had the authority to either withdraw or
publish any article for publication.
He said the editorial board's members then delegated the
control for the content of the articles to each unit head.
Fikri, occasionally inserting humor in his testimony, also
criticized the Information Ministerial Decree which did not
explicitly describe the reasons for the revocation of the
magazine's publishing license.
He said it was contrary to their previous experience, in 1982,
when the magazine's license was frozen for two months.
"We were informed that our publishing license was frozen
because of our article on the general election," he said.
He also said that the revocation had shocked all of the
magazine's employees.
"Some even cried on hearing the news, probably because of the
sour end of the wind of openness, or realizing that they would
lose their jobs," he said.
The trial was adjourned until Thursday next week, still
waiting to hear testimonies of witnesses provided by Goenawan and
the magazine's former employees.(imn)