Sofie Shinta Syarief – A free press in a democracy embodies the concept of freedom of speech and checks those in power while ensuring that citizens are well-informed. Both freedoms were at threat under Indonesia's former president. Things do not look brighter now.
As it is with the country's overall level of democracy, Indonesia's digital democracy is in decline. In the past eight months of the lame-duck period of former President Joko Widodo's administration, there were two regulations and two draft revisions to existing laws that will hinder or potentially curb Indonesians' freedom of expression and press freedom. Now that President Prabowo Subianto – who does not take criticism lightly – has taken power, Indonesia's press and civil society will need to firmly defend their rights and the rights of the public.
In March 2024, Indonesia's Ministry of Communications and Informatics (Kominfo) enacted Ministerial Decree 172/2024 to impose fines against digital platforms, including giant tech and social media companies, that fail to take down content deemed prohibited by the state. This decree is a derivative of Ministerial Regulation 5/2020, widely known as MR5, later amended in MR10 (Ministerial Regulation 10/2021) without significant change. It requires private digital services and platforms to register with the ministry and provide access to their systems and data. These companies must "ensure" their platforms do not contain or facilitate the distribution of "prohibited content", which implies they have an obligation to monitor content, including journalistic content.
MR5 has numerously been used to force social media sites to take down content deemed as "breaking" the law. While journalistic products are protected by the Press Law, social media posts from individuals are not. In early October 2023, for instance, X/Twitter informed the author in an email that it received a request from Kominfo to take down one of the author's tweets. The tweet cited an article from Indonesia's largest daily, Kompas, criticising Widodo's alleged misuse of intelligence to spy on political parties. After the author appealed to X and protested to the ministry, the then deputy minister claimed that their report against the tweet was due to "human error".
Similar censorship attempts were recorded by Indonesia's Southeast Asia Freedom of Expression Network (SAFEnet) during the heat of the presidential election in February, which aggravated the overall report on the country's digital rights in the first quarter of 2024. Yet, with the enactment of Ministerial Decree 172/2024, the government will be able to disregard individual or even organisational pushbacks and directly impose fines on platforms and terminate "access" to Indonesia's electronic system if they fail to comply after three warnings.
Another equally controversial regulation is Presidential Regulation 32/2024 (or the Publishers' Rights regulation) which came into effect in February. While it aims to provide a level playing field between the domestic news industry and digital platforms, it regulates content moderation and requires digital platforms not to "facilitate the distribution and/or commercialisation of news content that does not comply with the Press Law". In effect, a committee established under this regulation will have the right to decide what news complies with the law and force platforms to take down news that does not. Hence, this regulation undercuts the Press Law by disregarding the established legal mechanisms of the right to reply and the right of correction in journalistic disputes, which are means to prevent state censorship. When PR32/2024 is combined with MR5, the state effectively has the means to censor platforms and individual users, thus indirectly curbing the press.
Separately, there are two draft revisions to existing laws that journalist associations and activists have rejected. First is the proposed revision of Indonesia's Broadcasting Law. While the current law has long been regarded as obsolete as it was passed in 2002 prior to the advent of digital media, the draft revision bill could exacerbate censorship. In the draft, a clause on the "broadcast content standard" includes a restriction on the "exclusive broadcast of investigative journalism". During the deliberation of the draft in May 2024, one Parliament member had said the restriction was needed as journalists' investigative reports may influence public opinion and interfere with cases handled by law enforcement, to justify this monitoring. After a public uproar, the Law's revision was postponed in June.
The second is the proposed revision to the 2002 Police Law, which threatens press freedom and might further shrink civic space. One draft provision, if passed, will grant the police power to "block and cut off access to cyberspace" for national security reasons or to prevent cybercrimes. This proposed revision gives the police full discretion to do something previously deemed unlawful. A case in point was the state's shutting down of the internet in various locations in Papua and West Papua provinces amidst the 2019 unrest. This action was legally challenged, and former president Widodo and his then minister of communication and informatics were found guilty of violating the existing law.
While both proposed bills were halted by the previous Parliament, they can easily be picked up by the new representatives for deliberation now that the new government is in place. As President Prabowo's coalition has an overwhelming majority, there is a high likelihood that the bills may pass into law.
Digital media repression is an emerging global trend and an imminent threat to Indonesia's declining democracy. Indonesian media have been criticised for their overall failure to adequately function as a political watchdog, especially given the campaign to restore Widodo's dented public image. At present, Indonesia's civil society is far from consolidated and cannot meaningfully challenge the government. If democracy is to stand a chance under the new administration, Indonesia's press and civil society need to stand together to strategise their fight against autocratic legalism and to hold power accountable.
[Sofie Syarief is a former Visiting Fellow in the Media, Technology and Society Programme at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute and a PhD student at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK.]