December 19, 2025
JAKARTA – Prosecutors from the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) have indicted four activists arrested after the August nationwide unrest, accusing them of spreading social media campaigns that incite hostility toward the government and encouraging students, including minors, to take part in riots.
The four activists are rights group Lokataru Foundation director Delpedro Marhaen and staff member Muzaffar Salim, online activist Syahdan Husein from student movement Gejayan Memanggil and Riau University student Khariq Anhar.
They were arrested in early September following demonstrations that began on Aug. 25 in Jakarta to protest widening economic inequality, before escalating into nationwide unrest after the death of an online motorcycle transportation driver Affan Kurniawan, who was fatally run over by a police tactical vehicle.
Presenting their indictment at the Central Jakarta District Court on Tuesday, prosecutor Yoklina Sitepu said the four activists had published 80 collaborative posts on various Instagram handles that allegedly aimed at provoking hatred toward the government and encouraging public unrest.
“The defendants uploaded electronic information inviting students to participate in the riots,” Yoklina said.
She said that the campaigns, posted between Aug. 24 and 29, contained narratives that incited students, many of them underage, to join anarchic actions outside the House of Representatives complex, the Jakarta Police headquarters and other locations.
Prosecutors said the content were disseminated through accounts such as @lokataru_foundation, @gejayanmemanggil, @aliansimahasiswapenggugat and @blokpolitikpelajar, creating what they described as a “network effect” that prompted algorithms to amplify the content.
They found that the consistent use of hashtags #indonesiagelap (dark Indonesia), #gejayanmemanggil and #bubarkandpr (let’s dissolve the House) showed a coordinated campaign aimed at promoting the posts as a trending topic and helped fuel the unrest.
Read also: Calls mount to free activists arrested after riots
One of the posts cited in the indictment was a poster offering legal aid for students taking to the streets, accompanied by a caption saying: “Are you a student joining the action? Don’t be afraid. Contact us immediately if there is intimidation or criminalization.”
The poster, uploaded by Muzaffar and repeatedly reposted by other handles, was described by prosecutors as provoking students to harbor hatred toward the police.
The four defendants were charged with four counts of provocation under the Criminal Code, spreading hoaxes to incite riots and inciting hatred online under the Electronic Information and Transactions (ITE) Law and encouraging children to take part in their actions under the Child Protection Law. The charges carry maximum penalties of five to six years in prison and fines of Rp 1 billion (US$60,004) to Rp 100 million.
Delpedro maintained his innocence, saying: “We are not instigators. We are citizens exercising our rights. If freedom of expression is treated as incitement [to riot], then what is actually being tried is not us, but the democracy itself.”
The three-judge panel initially refused to allow Delpedro to read out his objection he wrote while in detention, but eventually assented.
The trial was adjourned until next week, when the defense will formally present its objections to the indictment.
Read also: Court’s rejection of activists’ pretrial motions sparks outcry
In October, Delpedro and the three activists lost their pretrial motions challenging the validity of the Jakarta Police’s decision to name them as suspects. The sole judges in their cases concluded that officers had followed due process and found enough evidence to name them suspects.
The arrests of the activists have been widely criticized by rights groups and democracy advocates as unlawful and a dangerous precedent that undermines freedom of protest and assembly.