The Press Council has named eight media figures and a retired senior justice as its new members for the 2010-2013 period.
“Each element has three representatives. Representing journalists are Bambang Harimurti, Margiono and Bekti Nugroho,” council deputy chairman Leo Batubara told The Jakarta Post in Jakarta on Thursday.
Bambang is a senior journalist of Tempo magazine, Margiono is the chairman of the Indonesian Journalist Association (PWI) while Bekti is the secretary-general of the Indonesian Television Journalist Association (IJTI).
“From the media companies, the council has [appointed] Satria Naradha, Ridlo Eisy and Zulfiani Lubis,” Leo said.
Satria is the owner of the Bali Post group and Ridlo is the chairman of the Newspaper Publihers’ Union (SPS) and also works as an expert staff for the Bandung-based Pikiran Rakyat daily, while Zulfiani is the chairman of the Association of Private Television Associations (ATVSI) and an executive of ANTV TV station.
“Last but not least, Agus Sudibyo, Wina Armada, and Bagir Manan were appointed to represent civil society groups,” Leo said.
Agus is the director of the Science, Technology and Ethics Foundation, Wina is a press freedom activist and Bagir Manan is former chief justice at the Supreme Court.
Leo said that all of the nine were chosen based on their good track records, which showed consistent stance to promote press freedom.
“The council also considers them to have sufficient capacity to lobby the House of Representatives and the government in efforts to revise a number of legislative products found substantially repressive to the press,” he said.
The 1999 Law on National Press mandates the establishment of the press council, whose main task is to maintain press freedom and help settle any disputes among the media and between the media and other institutions.
Leo said one of laws that needs immediate review is the 2008 Law on Information and Electronic Transaction, which was used by a private general hospital and law enforcers to prosecute a house
hold mother, Prita Mulyasari, for having used the Internet to share with colleagues her experience about the hospital’s poor service.
“Another challenge is to monitor the deliberation of the state secrecy bill,” Leo said, adding that the press council had to closely monitor the legislative body’s deliberation of the bill.
The bill was not passed in the previous House term, following mounting opposition from the media and civil society groups.
The bill contains contentious articles because all things related to state institutions, including defense, military and state-owned enterprises, were included as items of state secrecy.
The House should mention only certain things that can be held as state secrets, while others should be open to the public, he said.
Agus Sudibyo, who was one of the leading actors preventing the secrecy bill from being passed, acknowledged that the new press council would face not only greater challenges but also complicated press problems, including citizen journalism.
“Our main problem now is really that the government has been trying to regain control over the media by issuing regulations that are not in line with the press freedom,” he said.
Agus also said another issue the new council had to cope with immediately was the growing phenomenon of citizen journalism via social media networks, such as blogs, Facebook and Twitter.
“As the press council, it is our obligation to guard the spirit of citizen journalism. However, we must also make it clear to all citizens to prevent them from exploiting journalism in their reports to the public.
“All journalistic products must be based on the code of ethics and the press council must strengthen its coordination with other relevant institutions to uphold the code of ethics,” he said.
