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The 2002 Broadcasting Law is being reviewed in the House of Representatives — an astonishing development given that the law supports a democratic system of regulation for broadcasters.

The law outlines the functions of the Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI) as a regulatory body. It also governs the national broadcasting system and community media.

The review was proposed in 2009 with the intention of strengthening the KPI. But there are concerns that the review might backfire and instead revive government control of the media.

Such concerns arise in the context of moves by the state to regain some control over the media through legislation like the Motion Picture Law, the Information and Electronic Transactions Law and the draft bill on public broadcasting regulation.

Today’s broadcasting problems come not from the Broadcasting Law but from regulations on private and community broadcasting that were passed in 2005 and that ignore the spirit of the law.

An effective national broadcasting system has not yet been established due to resistance from the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, even though such a system would encourage diversity of ownership.

Government regulations also hamper diversity of content by encouraging a monopoly on information.

Community broadcast media are not able to operate maximally because under existing regulations, they are only allowed to broadcast within a radius of 2.5 kilometers. As for frequency allocations, they just have 1.5 percent of the bandwidth compared to 20 percent for public broadcasters and 78.5 percent for commercial broadcasters.

Together with 1999 Press Law, the Broadcasting Law is a symbol of civil society’s victory in promoting free and independent media and advancing the public interest. However, it limits some industrial and political interests.

The law forces the television industry to limit its coverage and cooperate with local stations under a network system. The law also limits the role of the ministry in issuing broadcasting permits.

Left with little wiggle room, corporate TV networks and government officials could lobby for new regulations that would protect the interests of both the networks and the government, likely expanding their powers in the process.

Thus, delaying the establishment of a broadcasting network system benefits Jakarta-based stations because they are near the seat of power.

Limiting the KPI’s role to just monitoring TV programs — rather than acting as an overarching watchdog regulating the entire broadcasting system — is far from ideal.

Under the present setup, Jakarta-based stations tend to dominate the airwaves, leaving out weaker — but quality — TV stations in regions across the country. This allows the spread of banal programs on private TV, which are merely ratings-oriented and rarely promote values or educate the people.

The cultural diversity of Indonesia itself is at risk if the populace continues to consume homogenous, insipid content broadcast by many Jakarta stations.

In terms of local economies, the 2005 government regulations do not support local enterprises as encouraged by decentralization. For community broadcasting, the regulations also limit grassroots expression.

But instead of reviewing these government regulations that are clearly pro-market and pro-state, the Broadcasting Law has been brought to the legislature for review or revision.

The review threatens media freedom and may lead the broadcasting system in the country to become more state- and market-controlled. In the end, it will be the public that loses.

There are now three draft broadcasting bills, from the House of Representatives, the central government and the KPI.

Civil society groups have turned their attention to the draft by the central government, which has raised a variety of concerns on media independence, including reducing the KPI’s powers and encouraging media monopolies.

I believe that turning the KPI into a toothless body is part of an effort by the government to regulate the media, as in previous decades.

Officials don’t want an independent body to regulate the media — a feature of modern democratic societies.

Under the law, media owners are theoretically permitted to have only one station in each province. But Media Nusantara Citra, for example, operates three channels — RCTI, Global TV and MNC TV (formerly TPI) — in the capital.

Diversity of ownership is also threatened by the mergers or planned mergers of Indosiar and SCTV, Trans TV and Trans7, as well as TVOne and ANTV.

Frequency, then, is given to merged entities with a large share of the bandwidth. This is against the principle of frequency as public property.

Other violations take place in the area of foreign ownership of media. Some foreign companies are reported to have, directly or indirectly, more than the 20 percent maximum stake set by law.

Civic groups believe that the central government’s draft leaves media to state and market control, which would defeat the purpose of free media and run counter to democratic principles.

R. Kristiawan is program manager for media and information at the Tifa Foundation in Jakarta.