Fears of a crackdown on Indonesia's domestic media were expressed at a seminar in Jakarta, with senior media figure Goenawan Mohamad saying that if this was so, many people were ready to fight such a move.
"There was a lot of sacrifice by journalists to gain freedom of the press," he told the seminar organized by the Jakarta Foreign Correspondents' Club Tuesday. "I am afraid another attempt will be made to reduce press freedom. If that happens, there is no alternative but to fight again, and we are ready."
Mohamad was the editor of Tempo magazine when it was closed by the government in 1994. He shared the platform with another victim of Soeharto-era press control, Aristedes Katoppo, whose Sinar Harapan daily was closed in 1988.
Also on the panel were Solahudin, secretary general of Aliansi Jurnalist Independen (AJI), Dr. Marty Natalagawa, newly appointed spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, and Australian journalist Lindsay Murdoch. Murdoch hit the news on March 10 when he announced that the Indonesian government had refused to renew his visa to work as a journalist, suggesting that the decision was linked to his reporting on human rights issues.
Katoppo had a more mellow view of the government's approach to the media, saying his new daily, using the same name as his old publication, did receive many calls from officials and the military but never containing the threats that were so common a feature of the Suharto era.
He said what was of greater concern was the tendency of those who felt slighted by the media to send gangs of thugs around to intimidate journalists and editors. The most recent case followed a report on a new election for the governor of North Sulawesi that stated that the previous election was flawed by vote-buying.
Katoppo added that, with the Murdoch case, it also had to be remembered that other countries, including Australia and the US, often declined visas for Indonesian journalists who wanted to report from those countries.
The media also had to be aware of the requirement to work professionally. More freedom also included equality in the eyes of the law for all people.
Referring to his own paper's attempts to uncover the truth behind the case of East Timorese orphans who were taken to Indonesia – one report alleged to have resulted in the refusal to extend Murdoch's visa – he said that it had transpired that everyone agreed that the children should be returned to their parents.
Nevertheless neither Indonesian nor international authorities had begun the process required to re-unite the families, and in the meantime the children were being well cared for. "Sometimes stories are simplified," Katoppo said. "It is very easy in these stories to take a shortcut, and distortions can happen." He stressed that he had not read Murdoch's report on the case and was not making any sort of judgement on them.
AJI's Solahudin said that if the government wanted to restrain press freedom it had no need to change the laws but only needed to use current law on defamation. "AJI sees the moves [to change legislation on the press] as an attempt to win back control." Referring to the Murdoch case, he said "this incident has signalled that a journalist could be punished without any reason."
The Foreign Ministry's Dr. Natalagawa came under heavy pressure in the question and answer session, with questioners demanding an explanation of the committee that had made the ruling on Murdoch's work permit.
He strove to convince the audience that the decision had been made because the authorities were under the impression that a successor for The Sydney Morning Herald/The Age correspondent had already been nominated and it was considered three months was enough for a handover.
He said the committee was similar to those of other countries that made decisions on immigration issues and there was no reason to suggest that it was in any way sinister. He said denials of its existence by the head of immigration and intelligence chief AM Hendropriyono may have been simply because they were not aware of its existence.
He said there were many in the Foreign Ministry who could not accept restraints on freedom of the press, and there was no intention on the part of government to censor news or control what correspondents were allowed to work in the country and those who were not. There was clearly a discrepancy in understanding between the papers Murdoch represented. "What we would like to appeal to all is not to present the case as something other than an arrangement that did not go as smoothly as we wanted."
Lindsay Murdoch, in a prepared statement, said his employers regretted the publicity surrounding the case that had damaged Indonesia's image as an open society. However, they "must and will stand on the principle that a foreign government can not pick and choose a correspondent." He said the two papers' owner, John Fairfax Pty. Ltd., had deliberately kept quiet any news of the dispute over his status since questions were first raised by the Indonesian side last November, despite urgings from members of the media to go public earlier.
In later comments, Murdoch asked if a compromise might still be possible, to which the Foreign Ministry spokesman responded that "we have taken note of the point made by Lindsay and we will look into the matter".
Senior Indonesian media sources said after the seminar closed that they believed the Foreign Ministry was again being forced to "wash the dishes" for a decision made by other parties, and it was highly likely that such parties were using the case to create friction between Australia and Indonesia. It was also likely that the main target of this attack was not Australia but the Indonesian government itself.