Australia helps Acehnese school

Nani Afrida, The Jakarta Post, Banda Aceh

Seven months after the tsunami, spirits at a medical polytechnic campus have picked up despite the destruction wrought by the disaster still evident. There is no signpost bearing the campus name nor fence surrounding the school.

All activity on the campus, located next to Zainoel Abidin General Hospital, ceased for three months after the tsunami.

"Back then, the campus was covered in deep mud. Fortunately, the Australians helped, cleaning up the building and assisting in replacing damaged facilities," said Beti, a second-year nursing student.

Australians have earned a special place in the students' hearts. Besides helping to cleanup the campus, several Australian soldiers taught the nursing school students for around a month due to a lack of teachers.

On Thursday, with bright faces, the students greeted the arrival of Australian Ambassador David Ritchie (photo above) to their campus. He did not arrive empty-handed but came armed with 1,450 scholarships for nursing school students and other Acehnese students, including 600 scholarships to further their studies in Australia.

"Our assistance to young nurses will help them continue and finish their education because many of them lost everything (in the disaster)," Ritchie announced in Banda Aceh.

He said the assistance would cover the educational needs of Acehnese children, and that A$1 billion (Rp 76 trillion) had been set aside to assist education and health care in the province.

The assistance was happily welcomed by Beti and other students, who said they had been unable to pay their education expenses following the tsunami.

"I'm lucky because I and my parents survived the tsunami. But many of my friends were orphaned and the scholarships will help them," the 19-year-old Beti said.

Apart from providing scholarships, the Australian government will also build 66 subdistrict offices in Aceh Besar regency and Ulee Lheue Port in Banda Aceh.