'TVRI's role and status in terminal decline: Expert
JAKARTA (JP): State-owned television station TVRI's role and status in Indonesian society is in free fall, television observer William Atkins from Australia said last week.
"If you look at TVRI, in terms of the ratings, it is not a popular channel. The entertainment offered by RCTI, or Indosiar, or SCTV, is far more popular," Atkins said.
Atkins, a postgraduate researcher at the Department of Government of the University of Sydney, was in town last week to attend a seminar on press freedom in Asia.
However, he acknowledged the importance of TVRI as the sole provider of news for commercial networks in Indonesia, which are required by the government to relay its news bulletins.
"But apart from this, it's difficult for TVRI to maintain its role and its influence with the public," said the author of Satellite Television and State Power in Southeast Asia: New Issues of Discourse and Control.
He said that the state television provides information on events as the Indonesian government sees fit to tell the public.
"Based on other countries experiences, if we deny evolution, the growth of information, people will become cynical and won't believe what the state broadcast tells them," Atkins said.
He suggested that TVRI balance, improve and compete with commercial networks to become trustworthy information providers.
TVRI is funded by license fees and government grants and more recently, a share of the advertising revenues of the five commercial broadcasters which have been set up in the past six years.
Atkins praised the government's announcement in February 1993 to allow commercial stations to broadcast their own news service by the end of the year as a move toward openness.
Unfortunately, he said, in the climate of greater government control of news reflected by the banning of three high profile magazines, the initiative has gone into limbo. "There's quite an ambiguous message," Atkins said.
He said that there is an attempt to make news service a part of government "information", rather than allowing alternative news to develop in line with the broader communication development of the commercial sector.
"In this situation, people will turn to other organizations such as the BBC, Australian television or CNN," Atkins said.
The decline of TVRI has coincided with the rise of the commercial broadcasting sector, he said. "However, the five networks maintain close relation with the government, functioning according to informal guidelines rather than principles enshrined in a broadcasting act," Atkins said.
"The commercial players are 'largely controlled by the state, and have been established in a way that makes them a compliant adjunct to the political and cultural objectives of the government'," Atkins quoted Philip Kitely, who wrote a book called Fine Tuning Control: Commercial Television in Indonesia.
Wimar Witoelar, a political observer and popular former talk show host, said that TVRI cannot be blamed for becoming the government's propaganda tool.
"Television is an extension of the government's power. TVRI is the legitimate tool of government propaganda. People can't blame TVRI for being the voice of the government because that's what it was designed for," Wimar said.
Wimar's talk show Perspektif on private television station SCTV was banned last year, reportedly because it was often critical of the government.
"Private television networks are also an extension of the government, not in the broadcasting sense alone, but in the relationship of the owners to the power structure," he added.
Television stations are the victims of pressure from the power holders, to maintain their positions and the status quo, Wimar said.
He suggested commercial networks should not be preoccupied with what the government wants and just concentrate on building up their own expertise. (31)