Jakarta – The House of Representatives passed three bills into law during a plenary session Tuesday, but two have drawn heated criticism from industry experts.
The House passed the environment management bill, the electricity bill and the film bill into law. However, only the environmental bill managed to be passed unscathed.
The Indonesian film industry believes the new 2008 law on film will restrict creativity and the freedom to make movies as they claim it gives too much power to the government, especially the Culture and Tourism Ministry, to interfere in film production.
The film industry has specifically criticized Articles 14 and 17. Article 14 of the new law stipulates that movie producers have to acquire operational permits from several ministries and local administrations.
Article 17 stipulates that before making a movie, a production house must report its plans, title and plot to the ministries. Under the new law, production can only begin three months after the report has been submitted.
A number of directors and actors, including noted filmmakers Riri Riza and Nia Dinata, staged a protest during Tuesday's plenary session. "What we want is a bill that will protect the freedom of stakeholders in the film industry," Riri told reporters.
"However, the essence of this bill is nothing but more and more censorship. Now we have two layers of censorship. The first one is before a movie is produced, while the other takes place after the production process is complete."
Riri also said he regretted the fact the House had not sufficiently involved film industry stakeholders in deliberations of the bill. "We did attend a hearing with the House on Aug. 31. Surprisingly, it took the House only eight days to endorse the bill without any further discussions," he said.
Culture and Tourism Minister Jero Wacik, however, has jumped to the defense of the bill, saying the bill would improve the country's film industry, because it regulated cinema owners to allocate 60 percent of its movie slots to local movies. However, Riri said the protectionist style requirements were pointless.
"That stipulation will only encourage the production of low-quality movies to fulfill the 60 percent quota," he said.
The passage of the electricity bill was also greeted with protest from the state electricity firm PT PLN's labor union.
The union said the newly passed electricity law was nothing more than an instrument to aid the privatization of electricity resources, currently under the sole ownership of PLN.
The environmental management bill was passed without much resistance despite it containing harsher jail terms and fines for polluters.
The new environmental law also obliges companies exploiting natural resources to pay environmental tax to be used to restore areas damaged by business activities. The law also allows civil servant investigators to arrest those accused of endangering the environment. "There is no need to worry about possible misunderstandings between the police and civil investigators," State Minister for the Environment Rachmat Witoelar said after the plenary session. (hdt)