|
Indonesia’s Abdurrahman Says Some Media Spreading Lies
by Kazi Mahmood for IslamOnline
JAKARTA (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Indonesia’s President Abdurrahman Wahid called on both electronic and print media to promote truth in their coverage of the country. He said media outlets exist that are getting paid to spread lies and slander.
"There are media who are paid to publish lies or slanderous news," the President said Saturday evening in his speech at a reception to mark the launching of Metro-TV, dubbed the first news TV station in the country, in West Jakarta.
Wahid also lashed out at a number of international television stations whose coverage he said did not reflect the reality in Indonesia.
"There was a foreign television station that broadcast the mass gathering in Aceh and stated that millions of people turned up for the event," he said, referring to the mass rally in Bandah Aceh on November 11.
"In fact, less than 100,000 people turned up. However, thanks to a good television 'angle', it looked like [Banda Aceh] was swarmed with people who wanted a referendum. The fact is, people do not want a referendum," said the President, adding that there were more people who declined to attend than those who came.
"Tell the truth," he stressed.
The Free Aceh Movement (GAM) and other non-governmental organizations (NGO) said the province was ready for a referendum to decide its future.
“The people of Aceh want to break away from Indonesia. However, Jakarta is not going to allow that, not peacefully,” an official from one NGO said.
The GAM leader-in-exile in Sweden said that he did not believe in the words of Wahid, adding that the Indonesian government was ready to spread lies about the true aspirations of the Aceh people.
Foreign news agencies reported that several hundred thousand Acehnese participated in the rally last week. The organizers of the rally criticized the Indonesian police for raising road blockades all over the province in an attempt to thwart the rally from taking place.
In another development, Wahid has been given full support by the Jakarta Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) to complete his presidency term until 2004.
"NU Jakarta and the Betawi people support the President until his term ends. We are ready to defend him until our last drop of blood," the Jakarta executive of the NU, Zaenal Arifin, read in a statement in celebration of the organization's 74th anniversary in South Jakarta.
The support was the first one announced officially by the organization, which had earlier been chaired by Wahid for nearly 15 years before he was elected president in 1999.
Minister of Cooperatives and Small and Medium Enterprises Development, Zarkasih Noor, who also attended the gathering, also placed his support behind Wahid.
Zarkasih, who is also deputy chairman of the United Development Party, said that whoever became the country's president would not be able to settle the country's problems in a year.
"It's too naive to ask Gus Dur [Wahid’s nickname] to step down because he was seen as unable to settle the problems," Zarkasih said in the celebration, which was attended by at least 1,500 NU supporters.
Zarkasih called on NU's supporters not to respond angrily and not to be easily provoked by demands for the President's resignation.
He also suggested that parties demanding Wahid’s resignation pursue constitutional means by submitting the demand to the House of Representatives.
"Just send the demand to the House. It should be conducted constitutionally," Zarkasih said.
|
