Jakarta – Golkar Chairman Aburizal Bakrie has reported a number of Indonesian media organizations to the Press Council, alleging defamation.

Bakrie's lawyer, Aji Wijaya, said the businessman and politician had laid complaints against five organizations for reporting accusations that Bakrie had met with disgraced tax official Gayus Tambunan in Bali earlier this month.

"On behalf of Aburizal Bakrie, I filed a complaint against Kompas daily, Media Indonesia daily, SCTV, Metro TV and news portal Detik.com," Aji said. "For SCTV, it includes Liputan 6 [SCTV's news program] and Liputan6.com [SCTV's news portal]," he said.

Lalu Mara Satriawangsa, a senior Golkar politician and a spokesman for Bakrie, told the Jakarta Globe that the politician would also lodge a complaint with police.

Gayus was photographed by the Jakarta Globe watching a tennis tournament in Nusa Dua, Bali when he was supposed to be behind bars during the course of his corruption trial, with media outlets also noting that Bakrie made an appearance at the same tournament a day later.

Gayus has previously claimed to have amassed a fortune from bribes he received from 149 companies, including miners Kaltim Prima Coal, Arutmin and Bumi Resources, all of which are part of the Bakrie Group, owned by the family Bakrie.

The bribes, Gayus said, were in exchange for lowering the companies' taxes and ensuring the government lost its appeals against them at the Tax Tribunal.

Speaking on Tuesday, Bakrie said he believed he had been defamed by the reports, saying he had repeatedly denied the accusations but to no avail. "The news was spin doctored and turned out to be a slander, I think this is a character assassination," Bakrie said.

Speaking on Wednesday, Bakrie told reporters said the media must improve "their ways of reporting and be responsible so there won't be any more public lies."

Metro TV and Media Indonesia are owned by political rival Surya Paloh. Bakrie, a controversial figure even on his good days, has had a number of spats with the media.