We’ve seen many ridiculous defamation cases based on Indonesia’s controversial UU ITE (Information and Electronic Transactions Act), but this one might just take the omelette.
The police in the city of Mamuju, West Sulawesi, recently detained a man, identified by his initial H, who could be in trouble with the law over a joke he shared on social media.
According to the police, H’s joke went something like this: local police recently went public about a gruesome homicide case, in which the victim, named Martha, was thrown into the frier before being ‘mutilated’ into 12 pieces. Police are trying gather more information about Martha, and eventually locals came to the police to give them the victim’s full name: Marthabak Telor.
In case you didn’t get the punchline, Marthabak Telor is a kind of fried, sliced-up Indonesian omelette (ba-dum-tss).
But what may look to you or me like harmless word play is no laughing matter to the police (possibly for both Batman and Superman, too). They have arrested H on the grounds that his joke could cause public unrest (seriously).
“Even though he was joking, it could cause unrest if the reader is not critical enough in reading the post. Furthermore, the post included the Mamuju Police’s name as the institution that issued the press release (in the joke),” said Mamuju Police Chief Muhammad Rifai, as quoted by Kumparan.
Rifai said that H will be charged with online defamation under UU ITE, which is punishable by up to 4 years in prison and/or a fine of Rp 750 million ($ 56K).
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