May 26, 2023
JAKARTA – Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Mahfud MD said the government would soon be putting in place a regulation geared toward protecting the publishing rights of news companies, as he called on journalists to combat the misinformation expected to come along with next year’s hotly contested elections.
Speaking during a seminar held by Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University (UIN Jakarta) on Tuesday, Mahfud said the regulation would go a long way in providing aid for the country’s ailing news companies, which have long struggled to compete with the prominence of social media.
“We often see a news article from a media company that would be modified without [consent from the journalists] and reposted [by people on social media], who in turn will get the money,” Mahfud said. “That’s why the government is currently in the midst of preparing a regulation on publishers’ rights, which will be ready in the near future.”
Mahfud, who also serves as interim communications and information minister following the arrest of NasDem Party politician Johnny G. Plate on graft charges, said there were around 1,000 news companies in Indonesia as of 2022, compared to what he describes to be some 800,000 social media “buzzer” accounts.
“These [buzzer accounts] are everywhere, dominating our daily lives. All the while, the mainstream media companies are getting [financially] weaker, since there are less people reading [their news articles], and some [media companies] have even resorted to aligning themselves with certain political interests,” Mahfud said.
Read also: Big Tech in Indonesia may start paying news firms for content
As the curtains are set to rise on next year’s election, Mahfud called on media companies to stand firm as the fourth estate of democracy and maintain the principles of being independent and objective.
“The mass media is different from social media, where buzzers exist solely to discredit someone or to look for political gain. That’s why, there needs to be a process undertaken by media companies to provide the public with political literacy,” Mahfud said.
President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has thrown his weight behind the plan to enact the publishers’ rights regulation, which seeks to require online aggregators to pay media outlets whose content they carry.
“Big Tech’s algorithms tend to be concerned only with the commercial side of things and will push sensational and petty content that sacrifices the quality of authentic journalism,” Jokowi said during an event commemorating National Press Day in February.
Read also: Press Council wants sole authority in publishers’ rights law
The latest draft of the regulation stipulates the formation of an agency tasked to negotiate terms and conditions for the payment.
The idea to enact the policy on publishers’ rights emerged two years ago and was inspired by similar legislation in Germany and Australia, and is expected to be issued as a presidential regulation in late March.
The Press Council, meanwhile, has been demanding the government to continue giving it the sole authority to oversee the media industry in the country, including in the business of negotiating payments with global tech platforms.