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Educators call for education bill changes
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President Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo (left) congratulates newly inaugurated Education, Culture, Research and Technology Minister Nadiem Makarim (right) and Investment Minister/Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) head Bahlil Lahadalia (center) after their
inauguration ceremony at the State Palace in Jakarta on Wednesday, April 28, 2021. (Handout/Presidential Secretariat/Rusman)
F
ollowing the decision by lawmakers to drop a new omnibus bill on education from their upcoming legislative priority list, educators are calling on the government to use this opportunity to thoroughly revise the controversial bill, amid mounting concerns surrounding rushed deliberations.
The omnibus bill, known as the national education system (Sisdiknas) bill, has been touted by the Education, Culture, Research and Technology Ministry as a solution to modernizing Indonesia’s education system, as it seeks to supplant the 2003 National Education System Law, the 2005 Teachers and Lecturers Law and the 2012 Higher Education Law.
While Education Minister Nadiem Makarim had previously been eager for the bill – which is already included as a priority for the 2020 to 2024 legislative period – to be passed into law as early as next year, lawmakers thought otherwise, and ordered the government to go back to the drawing board.
“The [lawmakers’] decision is a positive signal for educator groups […] who have long called for the Sisdiknas bill to be omitted from any upcoming legislative priority list,” Iman Zanatul Haeri, of the Education and Teachers’ Association (P2G) said in a statement on Thursday.
The P2G, Iman went on to say, is urging the education ministry to be more transparent and accountable in revising the Sisdiknas bill. The group also urged the government to allow more room for dialogue “to allow for meaningful participation.”
Since the ministry started drafting the bill earlier this year, officials have said that dozens of stakeholder groups have been invited for multiple rounds of discussions. However, this claim has been widely contested, with a number of educator groups, including the P2G, instead saying that the discussions were a mere formality.
If the ministry wants to prove its commitment to facilitating public input, the P2G said that it needed to establish a specific working committee to cater to public input from education stakeholders.
