‘Kompas.id’ Wins Press Council Award

KOMPAS/RIZA FATHONI

Kompas Daily Editor in Chief Sutta Dharmasaputra (left) receives the 2021 Press Council Award for the cyber media category for the Kompas.id portal accompanied by the General Chair of the Indonesian Women Journalists Forum (FJPI) Uni Lubis at the 2021 Press Council Award event in Jakarta, Thursday (9/12/2021).

JAKARTA, KOMPAS — Kompas.id has been granted the 2021 Press Council Award as an online media outlet supporting press freedom in Indonesia. The award is expected to encourage all members of the press corps to fight for press freedom.

Kompas editor-in-chief Sutta Dharmasaputra said the award motivated the daily to transform and make more contributions in the digital era. Kompas believed that in this era of information overload, professional journalism was badly needed because it produced content that followed strict methodologies and ethics.

According to Sutta, a professional editorial board that adheres to standard operating procedures will provide quality information and have the capacity to decipher information in a comprehensive manner. This way, society could be enlightened.

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"We believe that quality information can accelerate or guide readers to the goal of achieving a better life more quickly," he said during the award ceremony in Jakarta on Thursday (9/12/2021) evening.

The Press Council conveyed its appreciation to media employees and companies as well as non-media institutions and individuals in the country who had contributed to realizing press freedom in Indonesia. The Press Council worked with 10 stakeholders in selecting the awardees in a total of 25 categories.

The selection process of the Press Council Award started by consulting with stakeholders and the press community to formulate its objectives, criteria and categories. Over the four-month process, 117 media outlets, hundreds of articles, 45 journalists, and dozens of institutions and individuals were nominated.

KOMPAS/YOHANES ADVENT KRISDAMARJATI

Readers read digital news in the form of the Kompas e-paper from the paid news service kompas.id. Audiences can access news anywhere and anytime with digital news (8/11/2022)

Encouragement

Asep Setiawan, the chairman of the Press Council’s Commission for Empowerment, admitted that the media’s task of fighting for press freedom amid the Covid-19 pandemic had been more difficult. However, the Press Council believed that the commitment and dedication of the press should be appreciated by presenting the award.

"Hopefully, the Press Council Award will collectively encourage us to always remember our predecessors who fought for press freedom. Hopefully, we will also maintain [our] commitment to continue the struggle to achieve press freedom in Indonesia," he said.

Press Council chairman Mohammad Nuh said that the Indonesian press corps needed journalists who could not only provide descriptive information, but also explain the causes of an event. The Press Council, along with its stakeholders, planned to develop a number of journalistic competencies that were needed to fulfill these aspects.

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Nuh emphasized that press freedom was absolute. All parties agreed that democracy was the way to manage the nation and the state.

Since it was launched in 2017, Kompas.id has won a number of awards. The article “Promise for Papua” by Kompas journalist A. Haryo Damardono, which was published on Kompas.id on 1 March 2017, won the 2017 Adinegoro journalism award in the cyberjournalism category. The following year, Kompas.id was granted the 2018 ID Website Award from the Indonesian Internet Domain Name Registry (Pandi).

That same year, Kompas.id won the gold and bronze awards at the 2018 Asian Digital Media Awards of the WAN-IFRA global media association.

This article was translated by Hyginus Hardoyo.