Don’t Blame the Indonesian People, Blame Some of the Indonesian Media

I know I’ve written not so nice things before on the current Indonesia-Malaysia row. I don’t blame the Indonesian people for this. The parties to be blame for sensationalizing the issues are some of the Indonesian media, who I consider as overzealous. Worse still as members of media, they failed to check the authenticity and veracity of the news, print or broadcast. I thought that would be taught in Journalism 101.

As an example, the latest row is about the song Terang Bulan. If the journalist had bothered to google or do some Internet search, he/she would have read that the song was composed by a Frenchman in the late 19th century and in early 20th was adapted as its national by the state of Perak, a state in Malaysia today. This was a long time before it was recorded by Indonesia artists and adapted as the national anthem of Malaysia. Go ahead look it up yourself.

Well, I guess these kinds will write and air anything to sell their newspapers and make more watch their television programs. The kind of reporting they are practicing is sickening and must be stopped. There is no need to make a wedge between us as there are so many things where Indonesians and Malaysians can co-operate for the betterment of the two countries. Like it or not, we are stuck as neighbors until kingdom come.

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