Perpetuating Media Democratization Thoughts at AES CORNER
Nothing is left behind when someone has died except charity, pious children, and useful knowledge. The wealth of knowledge is one of the charity and knowledge of the late Amir Effendi Siregar (AES). The knowledge heritage is in the form of books, thoughts, and students who pursue deep thinking.
That was the response from Aditya Siregar, the eldest son of Amir Effendi Siregar at the Launching of AES Corner and the thought book of AES friends and students, on Saturday (19/6/2021). Aditya said he is grateful to his father’s colleagues, friends, students, and everyone who knows his father. He Thanks those who have given testimony and immortalized and cared for AES books and AES collections in the AES corner catalog. He hopes those can be useful knowledge and good deeds for his father in the afterlife.
AES corner is a reading corner for all the works of AES, who is also the UII Department of Communications founder, from books of thought to his lifelong collections. AES corner contains 638 collections and 577 books ever written, compiled, and collected by AES. The language is also diverse. Starting from Indonesian to English.
Several collections in English appeared as his collection when he continued his studies at the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at The University of Iowa, United States. There are many collections there. From the 1980s to the 1990s. The themes also range from journalism, democracy, communication, ideology, and political economy.
“In the end, we hope that AES corner can become a reference for academics and students. AES Corner also could be the reference for media and communication studies enthusiasts who want to enjoy AES thinking. AES Corner is located at the Nadim, The Center and Documentation of Alternative Media Studies (PSDMA) at UII. Nadim is also located on the slopes of Mount Merapi,” said Masduki, one of the lecturers of the Department of Communications UII. Masduki also a colleague of AES at the PR2Media think tank (Media Regulatory and Regulatory Monitor Institution).
Remarks and Messages from Colleagues
Several colleagues, friends, and students were present on this occasion. We can mention, for example, Paulus Widiyanto. Paulus is a figure who became the chairman of the special committee on the Broadcasting act at the Indonesia House of Representatives. This act became a milestone in media democratization. There was also Prof Alwi Dahlan who also gave a speech at the beginning of the event. He said the waves (frequency, red) belonged to the citizen as AES was fighting for.
Even said Prof. Alwi that Prof. Priyatna Abdurrasyid, who is an expert in outer space law, also said about the waves (frequencies). Priyatna said that the waves are the right of the people. Professor Alwi wants to say that because this is the people’s right, the waves cannot be traded to the private sector.
“Hopefully the younger generation, who studies communication, will also be willing to study the technology. Otherwise, those of us in the social sciences will just nag all the time. Then we will always be preceded by the owners of capital who are the core concerns of AES,” said Alwi in front of the audience.
Apart from these two, there are also other AES friends, students, and colleagues present. Such as Nina Mutmainnah from Universitas Indonesia/ UI, Puji Rianto from Universitas Islam Indonesia/ UII. Ade Armando from UI and Darmanto from BPSDMP of the Ministry of Communication and Information also joined the zoom. Asmono Wikan, Eduard Lukman, Rahayu, and several which were his students at UGM, UII, UI, and journalists and media activists in Indonesia also joined. All of them hope to immediately emulate the work and ideas of democratizing AES media at the AES Corner managed by PSDMA Nadim Communications UII.
