Maverick Indonesia

KPI Award: Rewards for Best TV Programs

The Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI) announced the winners of the first KPI Award last Tuesday (19/03). The 2007 KPI Award was established to reward TV stations and producers that have provided the best programs for the public. The Award consists of five categories, namely children’s program, documentary, soap opera (sinetron), investigative news and talk show.

Hopefully, the award will spur our TV stations to begin competing to provide the public with more educative and positive entertainment, rather than a mere ratings fight against each other.

As far as I’m concerned, ratings had resulted in programs that focus on criminality, mysticism and pornography for the public. Yes, the public enjoy such programs, but are these kinds of programs in the public’s best interests?

One important thing to note was that the KPI Award was conducted hand in hand with the Association for Private TV Stations in Indonesia (ATVSI) and aired live by TVOne. This is an achievement by itself.

Such commitment by the industry would indeed help KPI’s effort in assuring the public with better quality TV programs. I’m just hoping that the collaboration for KPI Awards was not another plot by the industry to elude network television required by the broadcasting law (which should’ve been implemented at the end of 2007) or to suppress the issue of ownership monopoly.

The KPI Award ceremony itself was carried out in a manner typical of our TV stations’ variety shows. It was professionally managed yet featured too many dances and singers. Sitting on the last row of Crowne Plaza Ballroom that night, I feel that the KPI Award was aimed at entertaining the public rather than positioning the event as an effort to recognize the achievements by our national TV stations.

Nevertheless, ANTV managed to swoop prizes in three categories. Here are the winners by categories:

1. Children’s: ‘Surat Untuk Sahabat’ episode ‘Cerita dari Pagar Utara Indonesia’ by TransTV
2. Documentary: ‘Teropong’ Episode ‘Jalanan, Pilihan Ekstrim Mereka’ by Indosiar
3. Sinetron: ’I-Sinema’ episode ‘Siapa Sayang Lila’ by ANTV
4. Investigative News: ‘Telisik’ Episode ‘Bisnis Narkoba dalam Penjara by ANTV
5. Talkshow: ‘Topik Kita’ episode ‘Aliran Sesat’ by ANTV.

Congrats!