Writer
Duncan Graham
Duncan Graham has been a journalist for more than 40 years in print, radio and TV. He is the author of People Next Door (UWA Press). He is now writing for the English language media in Indonesia from within Indonesia. Duncan Graham has an MPhil degree, a Walkley Award, two Human Rights Commission awards and other prizes for his radio, TV and print journalism in Australia. He lives in East Java.
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Playing the hunger games
The nightmare sprung to life: A gang. Worse, an Asian teen gang. An hour before dawn. I’m alone. With a bike. Continue reading »
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Things unsaid, people unseen
The irony was thick as lard. What an indigestible image for International Women’s Day. What an appalling advertisement for the Melbourne ASEAN Summit and its Australian host, a claimed world leader for gender equality. Continue reading »
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Indifference killing democracy in Indonesia
A reason for Indonesians overwhelmingly supporting cashiered general Prabowo Subianto and a likely military dictatorship is because the electorate rarely reads; voters haven’t been taught to think critically so know little of their new president’s past. Continue reading »
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The parade of talk going nowhere
ASEAN has been around for so long media outlets rarely spell the full name – Association of Southeast Asian Nations. That sounds significant and grand. It’s not. Continue reading »
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Asia, Government, Media, Politics, Top 5
The coming of the fear
If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they don’t want to hear. ― George Orwell (Eric Blair) Continue reading »
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Keeping it in the family
Why did well over half the 200-plus million Indonesian registered electors choose disgraced general Prabowo Subianto as their next President? Duncan Graham has some answers. Continue reading »
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Farewell democracy
There’ll be a good indicator – if not a firm result – by the time most Australians go to bed tonight. Then we’ll know if the ferociously ambitious Prabowo Subianto – Indonesia’s political psychopath – will be running the nation next door and booting out democracy. Continue reading »
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Shafted by etiquette: Gibran deploys western sarcasm in Indonesian election
Just a fortnight to Indonesia’s big 14 February election and the mood is shifting as more than 200 million electors realise the reality – they’re being played by the oligarchs like puppets. Continue reading »
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Why Indonesia is more monarchy than democracy
General Soeharto who ruled Indonesia for 32 years last century used to stage a ‘Festival of Democracy’ every five years. This was export quality irony – the results were known before the poll papers were printed. Continue reading »
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Our leading lady in Jakarta is not leading
“So much for Australia’s engagement with Asia,” wrote former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer this month, punctuating a claim that the media gives “close to 20 times the coverage to the US presidential elections as Indonesia’s.” Continue reading »
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Goodish guy in bad company
Gibran Rakabuming Raka is smarter than his stolid Dad Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo, President of our huge neighbour since 2014. As Vice President Gibran could be a positive change agent – but that demands missionary zeal and the guts to challenge his dangerous leader. Does he have The Right Stuff? Continue reading »
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Equality is risky – best stay with blokes
Indonesians have just witnessed a messy, badly produced TV ‘debate’ between the politicians jostling to run the world’s fourth largest democracy facing a national election in less than two months. Continue reading »
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Facism – the fear that’s near
Could Australia face a fascist leader next door after the Indonesian Presidential election in February? That’s getting more likely as the polls harden, hoaxes flourish and slanders stir. Continue reading »
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Indonesia’s soldiers: Back where they don’t belong
In Indonesia old soldiers never die; they just infiltrate civic affairs, then grab jobs from the worthy and talented young, slowing the economy. Continue reading »
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The ghosts in the vote machine in Indonesia
Indonesian politics is about personalities, not policy. Some among the 20,000 candidates for national and regional office at the globe’s biggest one-day ballot next year must be driven by altruism. But how to vote? Who do the dead recommend? Continue reading »
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In the beginning was the word – and the word was UWRF
Indonesia’s expanding dark side was hardly noticed by festival audiences at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (UWRF). But for all his domestic popularity, Indonesian President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo is no reformist liberal. Continue reading »
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How to choke EV use – car first, service later
Governments across the nation claim they want to reduce pollution. On their list are electric cars. Consumers are encouraged with rebates, tax breaks and blarney, but discouraged by inaction on infrastructure. Continue reading »
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Tomahawk missiles over Indonesia? No worries, they’re only passing by
In the early 1960s, the then USSR started building missile sites in Cuba, near enough to Florida for endurance swimmers. This almost led to the Cold War turning flaming hot. Now Australia is to buy more than 200 US missiles and stage them close to Indonesia. Continue reading »
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Indonesia has what we lack – a day of unity
It’s banners and bunting season in Southeast Asia as our neighbours celebrate independence. Singapore finished its wavings on 9 August and Malaysia’s moments of pomp will come on 16 September. Like Australia, both won sovereignty through diplomacy. Continue reading »
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Unlike Indonesia we are outsourcing our defence to a foreign power
Did colonialism ever die? Distant major powers are making life-and-death decisions that will impact Indonesia, ironically on the eve of the Republic’s 17 August national day celebrating Soekarno’s 1945 proclamation of independence from three centuries of Dutch rule. Continue reading »
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Barbie makes a dash in ASEAN
Geo-politics is played on a world chessboard often by sad oldies in sober suits. To keep membership exclusive the polymath gamers use polysyllables and foreign tongues. Clearly not the place for a perky American doll. Continue reading »
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A genocide howling for an apology gets ‘regrets’
Before he left for a brief trip to Sydney, Indonesian President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo took a stab at reconciliation. It’s unlikely to succeed. Continue reading »
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Hawks only become doves in election season
Any plan to try and end the Ukraine war needs to be welcomed if sincere, well-considered, unencumbered, and authored by a respected source. None of those criteria applies to the peace proposal from Prabowo Subianto at the 20th Asia Security Summit this month. Continue reading »
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Be a man, consume till it kills. It will
The World Health Organisation’s No Tobacco Day last month had Australia announcing tough new ways to get smokers to quit. Next door the fag makers were doing the opposite. Continue reading »
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Compromise worked in Aceh – why not Papua?
There are parallels between Indonesia’s Aceh where an Ozzie surfer faced a flogging, and Papua where a Kiwi pilot is facing death. Both provinces have fought brutal guerrilla wars for independence. One has been settled through foreign peacekeepers. The other still rages as outsiders fear intervention. Continue reading »
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Indonesian’s embrace democracy – but do its leaders?
More Indonesians than Americans are likely to vote in key presidential elections next year. But Australia is focusing on distant North America, not adjacent Southeast Asia, the zone where the Titans could clash. Continue reading »
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The ‘Ugly Aussies’ rubbishing our reputation in Indonesia
Here’s a rough guide to Westerners visiting Indonesia. Continue reading »
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Indonesian politics scores an own goal
It’s the biggest story next door but barged offside by the Australian media for the Trump indictment and the ‘No’. There’s another factor: Soccer’s not our national game. Continue reading »
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Wake in fright but fear not; Ramadan’s here
It’s 1444 on the Islamic calendar and the holy month of Ramadan is well advanced with four weeks of fasting, prayer, introspection and goodwill. All commendable – though in the land next door the noise spoils the values. Continue reading »
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Indonesia’s untouchables stay that way
The outcome of a massive police-caused tragedy on Indonesia’s Java Island got less media coverage than a silly white woman’s argument with a brown cop in Bali. Continue reading »