GlobalInfo.org, October 1, 2002
Rights-asia: Media On Alert Vs Threats To Freedom
By Anil Netto
PENANG, Malaysia, Oct. 1 (IPS) -- Journalists in Southeast Asian nations with a
history of oppressive rule are casting a wary eye at attempts to clamp down on their
new-found freedom.
Media practitioners in Thailand, Indonesia, and East Timor have expressed concern
about what they see as attempts by government authorities and groups with vested
interests to curtail their rights to report freely.
In Thailand, one of the most open democracies in Asia, a reform constitution drafted
in 1997 guarantees press freedom but appears to allow for restrictions on the press in
the name of "national security".
And on the same year the charter was drafted, the media faced another challenge:
some 2,000 industry workers, many of them committed to media independence, were
laid off with the onset of the Asian financial crisis.
Since then politicians and vested interest groups have bought into the mainstream
media.
"They are more willing to blend their editorial independence to ally with the
powers-that-be," Kavi Chongkittavorn, the chairperson of the Southeast Asian Press
Alliance (SEAPA), told a seminar on media self-regulation in Bangkok in
mid-September.
He said Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's rise to power 18 months ago has had
serious implications on press freedom. The first six months of his premiership
witnessed outrageous media interference, especially in television and radio, noted
Kavi.
Over the last year, there has been continued pressure on media owners while the
withdrawal of advertising has effectively neutralized the media, he added.
"These tactics constituted a virtual privatization of media repression and allowed
Thaksin to argue that the government was not clamping down on the press," said
Kavi, who is assistant group editor of the Nation Group, which publishes the
independent 'Nation' daily newspaper.
In Indonesia, lawmakers are mulling over a new broadcasting bill that would bar radio
and television stations from relaying some foreign-made material in a move widely
regarded as a threat to media freedom.
The bill proposes banning the relay of overseas-sourced news, music and sports
programmes but does not affect direct broadcasts and telecasts from satellite dishes,
which are only available to a small minority.
Following protests, a decision on the bill -- which had been expected around this time
-- has been delayed to give lawmakers moore time to study the implications of the new
rules.
"So far, Indonesia's press is free," observes Saur Hutabarat, editor-in-chief of the
Media Indonesia newspaper. "But to be frank, we can see that our country's new
government has great difficulty working with a free press. In fact, they think we have
too much freedom of the press," he told the media forum in Bangkok.
Hutabarat thinks that Indonesia's elite for the most part understand that without the
press there can be no democracy. But very few are convinced they really need press
freedom. The reason: political corruption and the danger a free press poses to the
ruling elite.
Indonesia's press freedom, however, doesn't extend to conflict areas such as Maluku,
North Maluku and Aceh.
Media in Maluku and north Maluku, for instance, are unable to serve as a
check-and-balance on the parties in conflict as they have become part of the conflict
and have taken sides, Sabam Leo Batubara, the executive chairman of the Indonesian
Newspaper Publishers Association, said in another forum in Singapore last month.
In Aceh, "the media is unable to cover the news based on facts and truths as well as
on impartiality," says Batubara, who cites threats to the safety of journalists and the
media from the parties in conflict as the main deterrent.
In the world's newest nation, East Timor, the media are enjoying an enormous amount
of freedom, with financing the only limiting factor. But now a few journalists are talking
about the struggle to free themselves from the paternalistic behavior manifested in the
nation's post-independence leadership.
Since independence from United Nations administration last May 20 after breaking
away from Indonesian rule in 1999, East Timor now has a constitution that limits
freedom of expression in the name of protecting individual reputations.
The constitution also allows for the suspension of rights in cases affecting national
security.
Concerned journalists in the region like Hugo Fernandez of the Timor Lorosa'e
Journalists' Association (TLJA) think that self-regulation through a media council
might stave off government attempts to control the media.
Such a council, he believes, would allow the media in East Timor to realize its full
potential and enable the public to appreciate the role of free media in a democracy.
"Failure to achieve these goals would give the government an excuse to intervene," he
warns.
The longer new leaders remain in power, journalists in young democratic societies
say the more they have to remain on alert against threats to media freedom.
Like SEAPA's Kavi, who said that the Thai media has to be on guard against official
news management, Indonesia's Hutabarat is cautious:
"Indonesia's history tells us that the longer a president is in power, the more
repressive that president will be -- especially towards the press."
Article #17969
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