Devi Asmarani, Jakarta – The leading Koran Tempo daily yesterday lost the first of a series of legal battles against businessman Tomy Winata and was ordered to pay the powerful tycoon US$1 million (S$1.7 million) in a defamation suit.
The judges in the South Jakarta District Court found the daily guilty of running a libellous news story on February 6, in which it reported rumours that Mr Tomy was planning to run gambling businesses in south-east Sulawesi.
The court also ordered Koran Tempo, which is the sister company of the leading Tempo newsmagazine, to make an apology in national electronic and printed media for three consecutive days. "The accused have violated the law and defamed the plaintiffs," Judge Zoeber Djajadi told the court.
Mr Tomy had demanded compensation of 21 billion rupiah (S$4.3 million) from the daily's chief editor Bambang Harymurti, reporter Dedy Kurniawan and publishing company PT Tempo Inti Media Harian for publishing the article.
Although the article printed Sulawesi Governor Ali Mazi's denial about the rumours that Mr Tomy was planning to run gambling businesses in the province, the businessman said it had tarnished his good image. Editor-in-chief Bambang Harymurti told reporters after the trial that the daily would consider filing an appeal.
In December, the same court ruled in favour of textile tycoon Marimutu Sinivasan in a defamation suit he had filed against the daily. Koran Tempo was spared having to pay compensation sought, but had to apologise to his ailing Texmaco group in several media. The daily had filed an appeal on that ruling.
Press Council member Leo Batubara said there was no indication that the daily had broken any law, judging from the story headline that favoured the businessman.
He also said that Koran Tempo was not the first media that had linked Mr Tomy, who is known for his strong political connections, to illegal gambling businesses in the country.
"There were at least 20 other publications that had written stories in the past linking him to gambling. Why haven't the other 20 been sued?" he asked. "Frankly, I think Tempo, as the leading local media in investigative journalism, has angered many people," he told The Straits Times.
"And it is being punished as a warning for the rest of the Indonesian media organisations of what would happen to them if they continue to be critical."
In the past year, media figures and observers have warned that the press freedom enjoyed after the 1998 fall of the Suharto regime was under growing threat by lawsuits and physical threats on journalists and their media organisations.
Tempo's newsroom was last year occupied by Mr Tomy's people after the weekly published an article accusing the businessman of being behind the massive fire in Tanah Abang in Jakarta.
The magazine's editors and journalists were physically harassed during the attack and police did little to stop the attackers, who were later freed from any charge. Mr Tomy has also filed several other lawsuits against Tempo regarding the March article on the Tanah Abang fire.
Other media organisations have been embroiled in lawsuits as well. Late last year, the Rakyat Merdeka daily was found guilty in separate suits filed by Parliament Speaker Akbar Tandjung and President Megawati Sukarnoputri. Its editors were sentenced to five and six months' jail terms in the respective cases.