"Our community, national and state life is now full of unnecessary noises. Just look at how informal, mass or non-governmental organization leaders are now busy waging a war of statements against each other in the media which sometimes go to the extent of cursing the government or other parties," Marwan Ja`far, chairman of the PKB faction in the House of Representatives (DPR) said at the Parliament Building.
He said the situation was very much suited to the news-hungry media but it was hurting the community.
"It is quite sexy for media consumption but hurts social resilience. National energy which can be used for developing the country is spent on battles in the media," he said.
Therefore, he said, the PKB was urging all parties, both formal and informal leaders (from religious groups, mass organizations, NGOs and others) to revive the "tabayyun" tradition of seeking clarification from the leaders through which criticisms, corrections and inputs for improving the country could be conveyed directly.
"This is what parliamentary leaders and the government showed on Thursday in a consultative meeting when they got inputs and received criticisms from each other and at the same time formulated solutions to crucial problems faced by the nation," he said.
He said PKB hoped the same thing could be done by leaders of mass organizations, religious groups, NGOs in case they found unsuitable government policies.
He said he hoped the leaders could open a forum of tabayyun with the government so that people would not always be served with curses and a war of statements.
He said he believed if the tradition was practiced half of the nation`s problems would be solved.
He also called on mass organization and NGO leaders to stop cursing the government.
"It often happens that their criticisms stray far from the substance and are not supported by accurate data so that they have the potential of becoming slender," he said.
He said the PKB called for a halt to all kinds of cursing because they had reached an alarming level.
"It is strange that none of the government policies are correct. For some mass organization, religious group and NGO leaders everything from the government is always wrong," he said.
He said such behavior only hurts democracy and this was very concerning.
He said one of the tasks of informal leaders was giving good examples to the people. "We have now lost role models," he said.
He said "it is okay to criticize so long as the criticism is based on facts and data and also offers solutions. Indonesia belongs to us and so let us develop it together. Stop all the cursing as they will only weaken national unity," he said.
(Uu.H-YH/HAJM/S012)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
