Robert Go, Jakarta – An Indonesian journalist has declared himself to be the first victim of the authorities' efforts to clamp down on negative reporting – in particular, the coverage of atrocities allegedly committed by soldiers against civilians – coming out of the troubled province of Aceh.
Mr Dhandy Dwi Laksono says he got booted from his producer-reporter job at television station SCTV last Friday because he challenged the government's assertions that its soldiers did not mistreat civilians.
According to complaints he filed with the Indonesian Journalists' Association, the military took offence at SCTV's May 21 Special Dialogue featuring his interview with an anonymous Acehnese man who claimed he was tortured by soldiers.
The station's management and shareholders, Mr Dhandy said, received threatening messages from military officials demanding that such reports be censored. The authorities on Monday denied having pressured SCTV to act in this case.
The station's public relations manager, Mr Budi Dharmawan, said SCTV gets complaints all the time but its dismissal of Mr Dhandy was due to his failure to pass a six-month probationary period which ended on May 24.
But the journalist countered that he was promoted to the Special Dialogue programme after working on regular news programmes. He said a senior member of the staff had informed him on May 25 that the station would retain his services indefinitely. SCTV had also assigned him to long-term special programmes on Indonesia's elections, which are due to take place next year.
He said: "They did not clearly explain why I'm fired. SCTV did not tell me what I had done wrong in performing my job. I've been handed special assignments, something which suggests that the senior people liked my work and that I would be approved for tenure."
Regardless of the merits of Mr Dhandy's allegations against SCTV and the military, this case highlights a crucial question in Indonesia: Has the media gained sufficient reporting freedom in the post-Suharto era? Analysts and local journalists themselves say things are now very different compared to five years ago, and many restrictions on journalists have been lifted.
Members of the government have often boasted about the increasing press freedom as a sign that Indonesia's fledgling democracy is maturing. But recent developments suggest that censorship still plays a key role in the media's daily operations, and the four-week-old martial law in Aceh is providing fresh test cases.
Some experts said that when Jakarta slapped a ban on interviews with rebels and reports presenting the Aceh separatists' side of the story, the government showed its true colours.
Indonesian journalists said editors still checked with government officials before running material that could be considered controversial, and there was still too little independence within the profession.