Can Indonesia’s Chinese-language media be revived?

Thanks to a Suharto-era law, Mandarin is seldom used in Indonesia – even among those of Chinese ancestry

Yet with China’s continuing rise and increasing regional importance, could Indonesia’s Chinese-language media be due for a comeback?

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An Indonesian stallholder with a Chinese-language newspaper in Jakarta. Photo: AFP

Published: 9:00am, 8 Jul 2019Updated: 11:56am, 15 Jun 2020

When Chinese Indonesian Irene Santoso was a child, her parents had to force her to take Mandarin lessons in secret, as under the New Order government of the late dictator Suharto, all Chinese-language education and private media were banned.

But the young Santoso showed little interest in learning Mandarin and, now, the 38-year-old yoga teacher from South Tangerang city can read only a handful of Chinese characters.

“Because I live in Indonesia, it’s more important to learn Indonesian,” she said. “I am a Chinese descendant, but I was born in Indonesia. I am Indonesian – not Chinese – so I feel closer to local Indonesian culture.”

The ban enacted by Suharto, who ruled Indonesia from 1967 until he was forced to resign in 1998 after racially charged riots, caused Chinese language learning in the country to nosedive. Today, literacy in the language is far lower among the country’s ethnic Chinese – of whom there were 2.8 million at the last census in 2010 – than either of their counterparts in neighbouring Malaysia and Singapore.

Indonesian military strongman Suharto, pictured in 1967. Photo: AFP

Post-Suharto, however, there was something of a Chinese media renaissance as wealthy Chinese businessmen attempted to revive the long-dormant industry.

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