Jakarta – The Institute for the Free Flow of Information (ISAI) announced on Tuesday that Aceh is the least likely province to allow press freedom and the most dangerous for journalists in Indonesia's 34 provinces.
Throughout 2012, ISAI cooperated with the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) and the Southeast Asia Press Alliance (SEAPA). ISAI launched a project to assess press freedom throughout Indonesia through eight indicators, including violence against journalists, vandalism of editorial offices, threats against editorial staff, pressure to print favorable reports, lawsuits against media outlets budget, restriction of information, allocations for gratuities to influence journalists, external and internal censorship.
Aceh came at the very bottom of the list of Indonesia's 34 provinces for quality of press freedom, partially because of the murder of journalist Darma S. in February last year. "The murder of journalists carries extra weight in our assessment system," Irawan Saptono, ISAI's executive director, said.
Because of this, ISAI also classified Aceh as the most dangerous place for journalists in 2012.
"Although the Indonesian government already signed a memorandum of understanding with the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) concerning peace in 2005, political friction is very much alive there and this has caused violence against journalists," Irawan said.
Additionally, according to ISAI, Aceh journalists responding to the survey mentioned the prevalence of "envelope journalism", with news sources actively attempting to influence reports with bribes.
In contrast, the index ranking saw Central Kalimantan and South Kalimantan at the top of the list, making them the best places for press freedom in Indonesia.
"Public officials in Central and South Kalimantan are very open to reporters. ISAI researchers also haven't heard any reports from these areas concerning the intimidation of journalists," Irawan said.
Gayathry Venkiteswaran, the executive director of Southeast Asia Press Alliance, said, "This research can be applied to further the effort to advance press freedom in Indonesia."
The 2012 survey, which adapted the measurement instruments used by Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF), an NGO based in France, to assess press freedom throughout the globe, had been preceded by a trial run in 2011, the results of which were not released to the public. The instrument was modified to fit Indonesia's social context.
"We conducted a trial survey in 2011 to validate the instrument. Because it was just a trial survey, we didn't disseminate the results," Helena Rea, an ISAI researcher, said.
"Throughout 2012, we collected reports from AJI and the Press Council about press freedom in all [the] provinces of Indonesia. We have based our ranking on these reports," Helena said.
According to Irawan Saptono, ISAI's executive director, the survey may require further refining to determine the factors that influence press freedom in the various provinces.
Irawan cited the example that, "We might not have received many reports concerning press freedom in certain regions because there are simply not a lot of media outlets present there. We also have not included this as a moderating variable in our research."
"The 2012 survey can't answer the question of why some provinces are better or worse than others in terms of press freedom. To answer that question, we need to do another survey," Irawan said.
In a survey from the RSF called World Press Freedom Index 2013, Indonesia ranked only 139th position with a score of 41.05, four positions behind Thailand, which had a score of 38.60. Indonesia did improve its ranking by seven positions from 146th position in 2012.
Indonesia's former province Timor Leste earned the respectable rank of 90 with its score of 28.72. Indonesia's neighbor Papua New Guinea fared much better in 41st position with a 22.97 score.