KRjogja.com
- November 17, 2009
Yogyakarta –
Scores of students from the Politics of the Poor-National Student League for
Democracy (LMND-PRM) held a protest action at the University of Gajah Mada
traffic circle on Tuesday November 17 urging the government to provide free
education and review education policies that harm the people.
Action
coordinator Kholis Annasir said that government policies such as the Education
Legal Entity (BHP) Law, the National Education System (Sisdiknas) Law and
others have resulted in the majority of the poor being unable enjoy prosperity
because the cost of education is becoming increasingly out of reach.
“Yet the
state has prioritised a minimum education budget of 20 percent from the state
budget. But so far the available funds have never reached 10 percent. An
allocation of 20 percent for education meanwhile is still too small compared
with the funds used to pay off the foreign debt of around 35-40 percent
annually from the state budget”, he said.
Annasir
added that the education funds that actually reach the public are still very
small due to administrative dedications and corruption. On the other hand, the
country’s natural wealth – which should be a mainstay to fund education – is
instead robed by foreign companies in the name of privatisation.
“Concretely
the government has no intention or will to improve the education system in
Indonesia. The government is instead busy bailing out companies hit by the
impact of the [global financial] crisis. In the end the poor continue to be
buried under defective legal regulations and are increasingly far from being
prosperous,” he said.
In
commemorating International Students Day, which falls today, in addition to
calling for free education and rejecting the BHP law, the LMND-PRM also called
for an end to the privatisation of education, creating democracy in campuses
and schools, transparency in educational funding as well as improvements to
facilities and the educational curriculum.
“For us, the
solution to all of these problems is to replace the imperialist agent
administration of SBY [President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono] and [Vice President]
Boediono with an honest, united government of the poor,” he asserted. (Ran)
[Translated
by James Balowski.]
