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“Polite Watchdog”: Kompas and Watchdog Journalism in Post-Authoritarian Indonesia

Wijayanto

International Journal of Press/Politics, volume 29, issue 3 (2024), pp. 628-645

"Many studies have argued that watchdog journalism cannot flourish under authoritarianism. However, the effect of the democratization of previously authoritarian regimes on watchdog journalism is still poorly understood. This article aims to fill this knowledge gap by using Kompas, Indonesia’s old ... more

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Cyber Troops, Online Manipulation of Public Opinion and Co-Optation of Indonesia’s Cybersphere

Yatun Sastramidjaja, Wijayanto

Singapore: ISEAS (2022), 27 pp.

"Organized propaganda and public opinion manipulation are increasing in Indonesia’s cybersphere. Specifically, since 2019, there has been a marked rise of cyber troop campaigns that serve to mobilize public consensus for controversial government policies. Cyber troop operations played a crucial ro ... more

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Fearing the Majority: Catholic Media in Muslim Indonesia

Wijayanto

Media Asia, volume 44, issue 1 (2017), pp. 33-39

"It was 16 June 2016, during the fasting month of Ramadhan. Inside the Kompas newsroom, tens of uninvited guests, mostly wearing white, were visiting the office of the media group. They were members of Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), a hardline Islamic group well known for its sporadic sweeping of In ... donesia, mostly in the name of defending Syaria law. Two days before, a letter had been sent to Kompas newsroom from the FPI, saying they wanted to seek clarification about some of the paper’s coverage. That night, one of the journalists said to me with a bitter smile, “This is a special exception where a guest determined the date and time of the visit without waiting for approval.” As planned, around 1 pm on June 16, those special guests were seated in one of the newspaper’s conference rooms, welcomed by chief editor of Kompas daily newspaper, Budiman Tanuredjo, as well as some other chiefs of the media group from Kompas.TV and Kompas.com. In a video that went viral on YouTube, people could see that the discussion was rather one-sided. The FPI members spoke while the journalist were mostly listening to them. Munarman, the FPI’s spokesperson, accused the media group of unfairly covering recent events. He highlighted the news about the latest swoop in Serang Regency, which caught a middle-aged woman, Saeni, selling food during the day during the fasting month. It was carried out by Satpol PP, the municipal police of the local government specifically functions as public order enforcers. Munarman believed that the raid was virtuous, to enforce Syaria law. He said Kompas had reported the news in a way that portrayed Saeni as a victim and the Satpol PP as the aggressor. Thus, in the view of FPI, Kompas had hurt the feeling of Muslim people. They demanded the coverage to be stopped. They also warned the news organization to never again do such reportage. The FPI members did not stop there. Munarman and other FPI members also incited violence. In an aggressive tone, Munarman warned that such coverage could provoke a repeat of the incidents of 1998. This was a reference to the mass riots in the days before the forced resignation of President Suharto on 21 May 1998. The riot involved ethnic violence against the Chinese minority. Thousands of stores owned by Chinese Indonesians were destroyed, robbed and burnt. Furthermore, tens of Chinese women were sexually abused. There is still ongoing debate about the underlying reasons why the Chinese were targeted, but one theory suggests that it was part of a regime strategy to channel public anger away from President Suharto. Interestingly, despite believing that Kompas was not wrong in a journalistic sense, their journalists responded to the accusations with submission. Responding with smile and a lower tone, Budiman Tanuredjo said, “If we were seen as already crossing the boundaries (kebablasan), please kindly let us know” (Budiman Tanuredjo, 23 June 2016). In the same vein, the journalists from Kompas TV responded that “we were advised that we might have crossed the boundaries in our way, our news routine, we really make it as a lesson”. The other senior journalists who acted as a spokesperson of the media said, “Thank you for your reminder.” Instead of arguing that they were acting according to their journalistic judgment, they decided to admit that they were wrong and apologise to the hardliners. The submissiveness of Kompas becomes more interesting when viewed against the fact that it was not the only media to report the incident. There were at least 10 other online media that reported the raid on Saeni. Those media were Republika, SindoNews, DW, BBC, BeritaSatu, Detik, Tempo, The Jakarta Post, Media Indonesia and Viva. Republika – an Islamic newspaper – was one of the most critical of the raid, explicitly describing Saeni as a victim. On 13 June 2016, they wrote that the spokesperson of the President said that the President had given support to Saeni, “who had been the victim of Satpol PP”. The article’s title was, “Jokowi Gave Charity to a Mother Who Sold Food.” The use of the word “victim” implied that there was a perpetrator, which was the Satpol PP. Yet, FPI did not attack Republika or any other media. Only Kompas became their target. This article argues that the allegations against Kompas and its response were a result of historical factors. Kompas has been repeatedly attacked by Islamic groups due to its Catholic roots. This tendency is exacerbated by the fact that existing blasphemy law provides immense space to prosecute anyone deemed to be offending the feelings of religious believers. Kompas journalists end up internalizing a belief that being minority Catholic is an “original sin” in a majority Muslim country." (pp.33-34) more