Jakarta – The national media are coming under fire for their "exaggerated" coverage of Soeharto's funeral.
Ever since the presidential medical team announced that former president Soeharto died of multiple organ failure Sunday, the domestic media have occupied the public with every single detail of Soeharto's life, from the story of his impoverished childhood to the preparations for his burial, and even gossip about his second son's second wife.
"That is just too much," Effendy Choirie of the National Awakening Party (PKB) faction at the House of Representatives, said Monday. "The print media dedicate so many pages to Soeharto, and the TV and radio air programs on Soeharto from dusk till dawn."
Despite his status as a former president, Soeharto should not be getting this much attention, Effendy added.
Observers in fact began criticizing coverage of Soeharto as excessive even while the five-star general lay hospitalized at Pertamina Hospital. Only the rocketing prices of soybeans were able to steal media attention away from him for a moment.
Effendy bemoaned the fact that media had all but ignored the death of M. Jusuf Ronodipuro, one of the founders of state radio station RRI who passed away Sunday night at age 88.
Jusuf was one of the first persons to read Indonesia's 1945 Proclamation of Independence on the air. He also requested that first president Sukarno make a recording of the proclamation to document the historic event.
Usman Hamid of the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) said excessive coverage of Soeharto had squelched the voices of the victims of the 1965 tragedy.
"Some media have followed the stream of the government attitude, which seems to blow the Soeharto phenomenon out of proportion. Their coverage tends to force the public toward forgetting the political victims of his regime," said Usman.
He said that the Soeharto coverage had also distracted journalists from more important issues, such as human rights violations. He cited the example of the murder of activist Munir Said Thalib.
Effendy Ghazali, political communication expert from the University of Indonesia, said that some TV stations were not only focusing too much on broadcasting Soeharto's funeral but were clearly also narrating events in such a way as to endorse a message intended to sway the public in favor of forgiveness for the former president.
"We can see clearly that some programs are fully dedicated to this mission," said Effendi. He emphasized that this phenomenon would have a negative impact on society. "Our people, who already have a short memory, will find it even more difficult to define what is right and what is wrong." (alf)