ABSTRACT
A dozen or so writers sat around a conference table at Tempo magazine, waiting for Amarzan Loebis’ class to begin.1 Amarzan is one of Tempo’s senior editors and a noted writer, as well as a former political detainee and left-wing poet. Every Tuesday morning, Tempo writers and editors meet for an hour or so to hear Amarzan’s critique of the most recent edition of the magazine. As the writers straggled in, the conversation turned to Tomy Winata, and the infamous Tempo story that nearly landed chief editor Bambang Harymurti in jail.2 The story compared the tycoon to a ‘scavenger’, and insinuated that there might have been a connection between Tomy’s business interests and the fire that ravaged the Tanah Abang textile market. Bambang and two other editors were charged with criminal defamation.
