House of Representatives Urges UI to Investigate Talent Scouting Selection Controversy
Deputy Chair of Commission X of the House of Representatives, Lalu Hadrian Irfani, regrets the controversy surrounding the announcement of new student admissions at Universitas Indonesia (UI) through the talent scouting pathway. The issue arose when several participants who were initially declared to have passed suddenly changed to not passing after the system experienced a disruption.
According to Lalu, this is a serious problem. “This is very disappointing and detrimental to prospective students. Many of them have already received congratulations because they were declared to have passed, but then their status changed,” he said in a written statement quoted on Wednesday, 18 March 2026.
The PKB politician questions the professionalism of UI as the organiser of the selection. He assesses that technical errors on the website cannot be used as an excuse for changing acceptance statuses.
“If the system was problematic from the start, the announcement should not have been made. This indicates serious issues in the governance of the student admission system,” he said.
As a leading higher education institution, said Lalu, UI should uphold professionalism, transparency, and accountability. However, this incident is considered to tarnish UI’s reputation and needs to be evaluated to prevent recurrence in future student admissions.
Lalu Hadrian urges the UI Rector to immediately conduct an investigation accompanied by open clarification to the public. In addition, he also requests UI to restore the passed selection status for prospective students who were previously accepted but cancelled.
“Do not let public trust in a prestigious higher education institution like UI be damaged just because of this issue. The rights of prospective students must be protected,” he stated.
The turmoil in the talent scouting pathway selection or UI’s international class has triggered protests from parents of prospective students. One parent of a participant, WA, said her child was initially declared accepted during the initial announcement accessible on Monday night, 17 March 2026.
However, the situation changed within hours. Around 8:00 PM, the system was said to have experienced a disruption and could not be accessed. When it returned to normal around 9:30 PM, her child’s acceptance status changed to not accepted.
“What was previously green suddenly turned red. Even though we already have proof from before,” she said when contacted on Wednesday, 18 March 2026.
WA recounted that indications of the problem had actually appeared since the registration period. This talent scouting pathway is an invitation from schools, with selection based on documents such as report cards, achievements, English proficiency, and motivation essays.
However, according to information from the school side, the registration system had already experienced disruptions from the beginning. “There were errors from the start. So the system is not fully reliable,” she said.
In addition, this pathway is also paid with a registration fee of around Rp 1.8 million per participant. WA expressed her disappointment over the poor UI selection system.
Separately, UI has conveyed an apology for the inconsistency in the display of selection result statuses on the talent scouting enrolment system for the special international undergraduate class programme that occurred on Tuesday, 17 March 2026.
UI’s Director of Public Relations, Media, Government, and International Relations, Erwin Agustian Panigoro, revealed that this inconsistency occurred within a 40-minute period after the system displayed non-final data.
“This moment can cause confusion and disappointment, especially for registrants who temporarily received inaccurate information,” Erwin said in a written statement received on Wednesday, 18 March 2026.
Therefore, continued Erwin, registrants who need further explanation can send messages via email to [email protected].