No school principal?

Of the one thousand elementary schools in Bandung, two hundred are without a principal. "This is serious and quite disturbing," said Kusmeni Hartadi, as reported in Pikiran Rakyat on May 20, 2000. Furthermore, it was rumored that to get the post of school principal a Rp 5 million fee was required. Awan Gumelar, head of the Education and Culture Office in Bandung is determined to fight against such graft.

Reacting to this issue, I wish to stress the importance of boosting education in our country. An educator, Paulo-Freire, in his 1970 book Pedagogy of the oppressed describes those who educate as the oppressors and those who are educated as the oppressed. This means that if we devote ourselves to schools or education we are deemed as heroes as we struggle to help the oppressed.

Being educated means being free, and freedom is acquired by conquest, not by gift, says Freire. In this regard, it is sad that in Bandung some two hundred elementary schools have been operating without their administrators for the last six months. Note that if such a thing becomes widespread, it means that our future generation will fall into the oppressed category.

Hence, I appeal to the education authorities to rapidly handle such a setback. Note that the younger generation today will be the nation's leaders in the future. This is too indispensable to downplay.

ODO FADLOELI

Cimahi, West Java