An 18-year-old from Medan, North Sumatra, became the latest high-profile arrest for defamation under Indonesia’s Information and Electronic Transactions Act (UU ITE) after he allegedly insulted President Joko Widodo and the National Police on social media.
The suspect, identified by his initials MFB, created a Facebook alias by the name of Ringgo Abdillah – complete with fake photos of an unidentified man – to upload memes to insult President Jokowi online (a photo in this link shows that MFB uploaded a photo of Jokowi edited to make it look like he’s the devil). On top of that, he also posted statuses on Facebook taunting the police to find and catch him, such as this one below that reads, “A week has passed, yet not one cop has arrested me. What is going on with the police institution?”
But one cop, Brigadier Ricky Swanda, took notice of MFB’s posts and filed a warrant for his arrest on July 16. MFB was arrested around a month later.
“(MFB) has been apprehended and is right now being investigated in the Medan Police Headquarters,” said Rina Sari Ginting, spokeswoman for the North Sumatra Police, as quoted by Detik on Saturday.
Maman, MFB’s father, is pleading with Jokowi and National Police Chief to have charges against his son dropped.
“I apologize to the president and the National Police chief. My son is just naive,” Maman said, as quoted by Detik today.
MFB may face up to four years in prison for online defamation as stated in UU ITE.
In 2014, just days after Jokowi’s inauguration as president, a young sate seller was arrested for photoshopping faces of prominent politicians, including Jokowi’s, onto photos of nude porn actors. The culprit was arrested after police received a complaint from a politician in Jokowi’s party, but Jokowi later pardoned the seller and ordered his release.
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