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Instead, Ulil uses the radio to dissect issues facing modern Islam today. Unlike in the U.S., where an increase in conservative-Christian broadcasting has sharpened an us-vs.-them divide, Ulil preaches inclusiveness in his weekly 30-minute show "Religion and Tolerance." More than 5 million Indonesians listen in as Ulil preaches a moderate and progressive message of Islam. But not everyone appreciates his take: earlier this year, a west Javanese radical group issued a death fatwa against him. But Ulil remains undaunted. Just last week, he was back in fine form, discussing how each individual experiences Islam differently, a topic usually reserved for ulemas.
Other talk-radio hosts have faced similar threatsand morefor their outspoken ways. In the mid-'80s, Jun Pala, a firebrand radio host in the southern Philippine city of Davao had his program interrupted when an assailant shot him in the recording booth. The gunman was believed to be a communist insurgent, angry at Pala's vocal anticommunist stance. This year, Pala was shot at again, this time by men in police uniforms. Although Pala escaped unscathed, two of his bodyguards were seriously injured. A fellow Filipino radio broadcaster wasn't so lucky. The same day Pala was attacked, John Villanueva, a procommunist talk show host from the northern Luzon city of Legazpi, was shot to death on his way home from the radio station by two motorcycle-riding military men.
In Hong Kong, radio-show personalities face less overt intimidation, but their broadcast freedom is nevertheless being threatened. Albert Cheng, a bespectacled society icon and radio host, decided last month to take indefinite leave from his ultra-popular talk show, "Teacup in a Storm," after the Broadcast Authority warned his radio station, Commercial Radio, about his on-air conduct. (Wong Yuk-man's program is carried by the same station.) The warning comes at a sensitive time, when the issue of the station's licensedue for renewal next yearis still being addressed. The controversy centered on two shows this spring during which Cheng harangued government officials, calling one "doglike." The 57-year-old Cheng is hardly one to give in without a fight. In 1998, he was brutally slashed by suspected mobsters after he criticized Hong Kong's notorious triads on-air. Undeterred, he went back to his show. This time, though, Cheng isn't sure what he will do about the government warning. "We've been under a lot of pressure," he says, noting the rise in pro-Beijing sentiment among Hong Kong officials. "[But] we can't lose this freedom, this space."
These airwaves have, throughout most of modern Asia's history, been controlled by authoritarian governments rather than loquacious rabble rousers. Ever since the first crackly radio broadcast, Asia's strongmen have known the power of radio to rally the masses. Radio, after all, reaches even the remotest hinterland, as those listening secretly to the BBC World Service in places like Burma or Tibet know. When Ferdinand Marcos declared martial law in the Philippines in 1972, one of the first things he did was shut down the radio stations. For Marcos and other autocrats, radio was a tool of subjugation, not incitement. Citizens across Asia were forced to listen to monotonous government broadcasts trumpeting the latest made-up economic statistics or warming relations with an irrelevant African republic.
The role of radio in Asia began to shift in the 1980s, when the first shoots of democratic reform sprouted across the region. When Corazon Aquino led her bloodless revolution to overthrow Marcos in 1986, she was determined to use the airwaves once more. As citizens gathered in the steamy heat of their shacks, they heard then police chief and future President Fidel Ramos boast on the radio that the military had abandoned Marcos to join the people's cause. An exaggeration, to be sure. But the crow of victory prompted thousands to flood the streets and give the people-power revolution the critical mass it needed to succeed. So, too, in Thailand six years later did radio stations help mobilize hundreds of thousands of demonstrators, who forced the resignation of a military commander who had seized control of the country. "In many ways the voice of Thailand's so-called civil society was first heard and gained power on radio," says Sunai Phasuk, a political scientist at Bangkok's Thammasat University. "It's proven to be very powerful, and politicians clamor to get their message across on the airwaves."
Imperceptibly, radio was changing from a tool of power to a tool of the people. Nowhere was the shift more apparent than in Taiwan in the mid-'90s, when the then opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) depended on an underground station called Greenpeace to broadcast its samizdat message. (The station has no relationship with the environmental group of the same name.) On Greenpeace's unfettered airwaves, citizens could express proindependence views and criticize the then ruling Kuomintang (KMT). Many supporters called in at night, taking care to keep the lights off at home lest their neighbors suspect they may be taking part in the clandestine radio movement. "The station worked not only as a public-opinion medium," recalls Greenpeace head Chen Der-li, "but also as a command center to announce rally activities and to mobilize supporters to the democratic movement." The DPP won a landmark presidential election in 2000.
Now, people power up and down the dial has become a self-perpetuating force. Earlier this year, tens of thousands of Bangkok citizens had their radios tuned to 96 FM, home to "Uniting to Help Each Other," when the show's usual excited chatter was replaced by the ominous notes of a military march. The army, which along with the government controls most of Thailand's radio stations, had abruptly pulled the 24-hour show off the air. Critics claim they were punishing the media group INN for barbs aimed at Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra that were made on another INN-owned radio show, but a government spokesman denies it. The plug pulling wasn't unusual; Thai media companies are ever mindful of getting their licenses revoked and are often forced to adjust their programs accordingly. This time, though, the public came to radio's rescue. Within hours, thousands of irate listeners had signed a petition demanding their show back. Parliament was lobbied, and scores of taxi drivers, their cabs draped with protest banners, joined a solidarity rally in front of the radio show's offices. Two days later, the military backed down and the station was back on the air. "We were delighted with the support," says Somchai Swangkarn, managing director of the INN Group. "It's the first time in Thai radio history that listeners have protested on a radio station's behalf." Thailand's experience was a subtle presaging of what the Hong Kong government found out last week. This region is tuning in as never before to talk-radio hosts whose medium delivers powerful messages like no other outlet. Asia's communications revolution is in full swing, and this time it will not be televised.