Legislators question education officials
JAKARTA (JP): Legislators questioned Ministry of Education and Culture officials on Monday over concerns that education was being exploited for business opportunities.
During the hearing, legislators raised the issue of school book prices and the fact that universities were increasingly opening up extension programs to rake in more revenues.
Cahyono HS of the House of Representatives' Armed Forces faction questioned the high price of school books for students in rural areas. "Would this have any relation to reports of corruption, collusion and nepotism in school book publishing?" another member asked.
During a break, Indra Djati Sidhi, the ministry's director general for basic and middle education, said it was "impossible" that school book bids were rigged "because every bid is held according to official procedures" and each had its own code.
On Monday, Indonesian Corruption Watch (ICW), a government watchdog, estimated that Rp 400 billion, or 30 percent of the World Bank's Book and Reading Interest Project funds to Indonesia had gone unaccounted for. The project targets high school students and has been scheduled to run from 1996 to 2000.
ICW, coordinated by Teten Masduki, said the ministry's bid mechanism was to blame for the leakage in funds.
"We demand that the World Bank postpone its funds for 1998 until the leakage can be further investigated," ICW said.
It alleged that corruption within the ministry had forced book prices to increase by as much as 30 percent above normal prices. School books are also very poorly produced, ICW said.
The books to be screened in the bid mechanism, ICW charged, had already been determined by the ministry based on a recommendation by the national committee in charge of evaluating high schools. "Usually a quota for each of the books is divided equally (among selected publishers) in line with an agreement with the ministry," ICW said.
Indra argued, however, that the bidding process was jointly supervised by the ministry and the World Bank.
"Qualifications from the World Bank for publishers to win the bid include the value of the book, the distribution network and the price," said Indra.
Wiyoto Nursahid of the United Development faction, asked about the requirements and qualifications for universities wishing to set up extension programs, a new source of additional income to most of the country's 76 state universities.
Bambang Soehendro, director general of advanced education, admitted that many extension courses had been set up without legal permits. He said a few of the programs, however, had closed due to a lack of facilities, including forestry and nursing programs at Medan's North Sumatra University. (01)