Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – Indonesia's longest-running television station, the state-owned Televisi Republik Indonesia (TVRI), may go off air if it fails to pay the millions of dollars it owes to a satellite operator.
Despite having gone commercial recently, the most widely accessible TV station in the country, with 400 relay stations, continues to encounter financial difficulties.
Private satellite operator Satelindo is demanding that TVRI now repay its 22.5-billion- rupiah (S$4-million) debt, which matured last year. Failing that, it has threatened to shut off the transponder used to broadcast TVRI programmes.
Speaking of the impending crisis, TVRI president Sumita Tobing said: "Our debts to Satelindo are due on March 17. After that, we don't know what will happen because we cannot afford to repay them."
The TV station also owed 200 billion rupiah to several foreign news agencies, she said. Pleading helplessness, she told the Koran Tempo daily: "How can we pay the debts if our deficits have exceeded 90 per cent of our budget?"
The station, which receives a meagre state subsidy of 150 billion rupiah a year, chalks up operational costs of 800 billion rupiah annually. It is supposed to receive 12.5 per cent of gross revenue from the country's private television stations. But some stations have not been able to pay their dues since the economic crisis.
Ms Sumita, who took over TVRI in June 2000 after years of experience in private TV stations, said the swelling debts were due in part to decades of poor and non-transparent management. She has blamed corruption and "civil servant mentality" as the root of TVRI's decline on several occasions.
She helped to resuscitate the station by introducing new programmes which enabled it to compete with the growing number of private stations. One of the programmes, Dansa Yo Dansa, has revived the popularity of ballroom and Latin dances nationwide and inspired other private stations to run similar shows.
She has also pushed for the privatisation of TVRI which is now awaiting government approval. It was under her stewardship late last year that the station, which had relied entirely on government subsidies since the mid-80s, began to accept advertisements to boost earnings.
Ms Sumita's efforts to modernise TVRI, established in 1962, include an attempt to get accounts audited by an independent firm but have met stiff resistance from company executives. They accuse her of practising a "one-woman-show management".
Several TVRI directors have been calling for her removal from the station. Ms Sumita's only response is: "I don't have time to deal with these kind of things."