Media Empowerment for Democratic Integrity and Accountability (MEDIA)

As lead partner, Internews has distributed subgrants to the seven partners to implement a range of activities, which include providing legal support, offering media viability training, enhancing the reporting skills of local and national media outlets, increasing the capability of at-risk journalists to prevent and manage threats, and ensuring more equitable and diverse reporting.

The following is a list of collaborating partners and their activities in the first year of the programme (2021):

1. Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI), an Indonesian non-governmental organisation (NGO) with over 2,000 members nationwide that promotes independent media, press freedom, and quality journalism. Activity: AJI led advocacy activities that helped bring alleged perpetrators of police violence against journalists to court.
2. Indonesia Anti-Slander Society (MAFINDO), a grassroots anti-disinformation task force and fact-checking outlet. Activity: MAFINDO engaged with social media platforms including WhatsApp, YouTube, and Twitter to address misinformation and disinformation online in Indonesia.
3. Media Cyber Association of Indonesia (AMSI), an organisation of more than 300 cyber media companies across 20 provinces working to improve digital literacy. Activity: AMSI launched an assessment of online media to inform independent media outlets about business sustainability.
4. Indonesian Association for Media Development (PPMN), a non-profit working to expand access to information in Indonesia by increasing media capacity and improving media literacy. Activity: PPMN empowered citizen journalists to bring forth personal stories in the community as a part of an advocacy strategy for better governance. Click here to find out more about how citizen journalists' stories have amplified local voices and held power to account.
5. Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW), an NGO dedicated to monitoring corruption in Indonesia. Activity: ICW pioneered the Investigative Journalists Club in Nusa Tenggara Timur, where CSO and media collaborated on monitoring corruption cases in the area.
6. Journalist Association for Diversity (SEJUK), a union of journalists dedicated to protecting religious and sexual minorities. Activity: The project seeks to train and support journalists reporting on issues relevant to sexual and religious minorities, among other marginalised groups, so that diverse voices are represented in public discourse. SEJUK supported young story grantees whose portrayals of transwomen in Kalimantan with diverse careers sought to break through stigma related to the trans community.
7. Legal Aid Center for the Press (LBH Pers), an Indonesian CSO that provides legal aid to defend press freedom, freedom of expression, and protection for press workers. Activity: This MEDIA partner mentored media organisations on their specific legal needs.

Above all, the project is designed to boost the resilience and sustainability of media outlets so that they can adapt to - and survive - changes in the media landscape. Due to the ongoing collaboration fostered by the project among the local implementing partners, MEDIA hopes that when the project ends in the summer of 2025, the seven implementing partners will be able to continue meeting and working together on common issues in a much-improved media environment brought about with the help of the project.

Democracy, Media for Development

Context, highlighting some of the challenges the project is seeking to address:

"Indonesia is the world's third largest democracy, but it has a tumultuous political past, including more than a century of Dutch colonization and 30 years of rule by the corrupt dictator Suharto. Since 1999, when the country held its first truly free election, democracy has taken hold. Despite impressive progress, the country's march toward full democracy remains hampered by problems such as widespread corruption, alleged vote-buying, misinformation, discrimination against minorities, political extremism, use of excessive force by police, and new laws to silence dissent.

Independent media outlets in Indonesia face economic and political threats that the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated. Further, the spread of mis/disinformation inhibits the public from accessing the information they need to realize their rights and hold the government and big businesses to account. Independent media serves the public by defending citizens' rights, increasing transparency, raising awareness, and improving accountability. Today, independent media organizations struggle for readers' attention against social media advertising, while at the same time, physical, digital, and legal attacks on journalists and independent publications are on the rise."

According to one local MEDIA implementing partner, AJI, reporters in Indonesia were victims of at least 84 violent acts in 2020, the highest number the group has recorded in the past 14 years. In October 2020 alone, AJI reported 28 incidents of police action - including intimidation, violence, and detention - directed toward journalists who were covering mass protests against an unpopular new law limiting worker protections. AJI also noted several instances of hacking, doxing (publishing individuals' private information on the internet for negative purposes), and other cyber-interference targeting Indonesian media outlets and reporters (in particular, female journalists).

At both the national and local levels, corruption is a problem in Indonesia, as is the safety of the journalists reporting on it. In addition, religious, ethnic, and sexual minorities present a challenge for journalists - both in the representation of minorities in the ranks of media outlets and in coverage of them in news reports, which often present them in a biased, unflattering manner. The project, therefore, seeks to make sure the media is reaching out to minorities to include them in their reporting. With Indonesia being very multicultural, the project overall seeks to build harmony in the country between these different groups (media and minorities).