MoU Between Kemendikdasmen and TNI AD Accelerates Post-Disaster School Revitalisation

Jakarta — The Ministry of Education, Basic and Secondary Education (Kemendikdasmen) signed a Cooperation Agreement (PKS) with the Indonesian Army’s Land Forces (TNI AD) to speed up the recovery and revitalisation of educational units after disasters in Sumatra.

Deputy Minister for Basic and Secondary Education, Fajar Riza Ul Haq, said the PKS is intended to accelerate the revitalisation of schools after disasters, including those classified as heavily damaged and those requiring relocation.

‘We hope that through this cooperation we can quickly complete the construction of heavily damaged schools and relocations in the three provinces affected by the disaster,’ he said in Jakarta on Friday.

He noted that the number of educational units in the heavily damaged category reached 267 schools across the three provinces, with the target to complete all by October 2026.

He added that the government continues to push for speeding up revitalisation of schools that suffered severe damage from natural disasters several months ago so that students can return to learning with better facilities.

In its report, the Director-General of PAUD, Dasmen (Early Childhood Education, Basic Education, and Middle Education) Gogot Suharwoto also stated that involving the TNI in accelerating school rehabilitation was based on strategic considerations, including the need for rapid rehabilitation in emergencies, the capacity to mobilise resources and logistics in hard-to-reach areas, the field engineering capacity and emergency construction support, and strengthening the resilience of public services such as education.

‘Through the cooperation with the TNI we will carry out rehabilitation on 267 educational units with heavy damage and those needing relocation,’ Gogot said.

‘The contract signing with Kemendikdasmen will then extend to the provinces, namely the Area Military Commands (Kodam) located in the three affected provinces. Earlier we had also been pushing to accelerate the rehabilitation of these schools, initiated by the Chief of Staff of the Indonesian Army,’ said Major General Rachmad.

He added that in the process the deployed personnel would be deployed according to the needs of the school construction process, so they hope all construction will proceed smoothly and on time.

‘We expect that with this agreement, everything will run as it should,’ he said.