'Education is being sacrificed for profit'

The protracted dispute over state middle school SMP 56 in Melawai, South Jakarta, has triggered various reactions among residents, including those who believe that the case has been politicized by a certain party. The Jakarta Post asked a few people for their thoughts on the case over the controversial land swap deal involving the school and a property developer.

Henry Wijayanto, 29, is a promotion & sales manager at an entertainment center in Senayan, Central Jakarta. He lives in Pondok Bambu, East Jakarta:

It is a regrettable problem. All parties involved in the dispute must immediately resolve their differences so that the students can study normally.

I hope the city administration will provide a clear decision on the academic status of all students who are still studying at their old school in Melawai.

I think the authorities are sacrificing education to business in evicting the students by force.

Besides, why does the businessman want to take the land that has long been home to a school? Can't they find another site?

Japanese freelance journalist, 31 (name withheld by request):

The Ministry of National Education should have realized that a school is a community unto itself and impossible to relocate without altering or damaging it, thus rendering the deal unviable at the outset.

Many small businesses are dependent on and are part of a school's surrounding community that has formed over many years.

Students have best friends among their peers and establish bonds with their teachers as surrogate parents. In the case of SMP 56, many of these ties have been broken as a result of students being dispersed to other schools.

All of this affects the emotional and mental well-being, as well as morale, of students and hence, their capacity to focus on learning -- the timing makes it worse, coming six weeks to the end of the school year.

The root of the issue is not about the legality of the deal, but the moral conscience of the ministry as the guardian of national education.

It has failed miserably in providing a stable and secure environment of learning to the students and teachers of SMP 56, yet several parties connected with the case -- including the National Commission for Child Protection -- have the gall to profess naively, "we must protect the students; we must remove them from further involvement".

The ministry embroiled the students the second it approved the deal.

--The Jakarta Post