Nadya Natahadibrata, Jakarta – The Education and Culture Minister Mohammad Nuh is in the spotlight again, this time for the massive failure in distributing materials as scheduled for the 2013 High School National Examinations, prompting exam delays in 11 provinces.
The ministry, which was recently under fire for its half-baked new curriculum, was scheduled to distribute the materials three days before the exam to allow for all provinces to simultaneously kick off the National Examinations on April 15.
But as of Sunday afternoon, no shipments of the exam materials had arrived in 11 of the country's provinces; Bali, East Nusa Tenggara, West Nusa Tenggara, South Kalimantan, East Kalimantan, Gorontalo, North Sulawesi, West Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, Southeast Sulawesi and Central Sulawesi.
For the 11 provinces, the National Examinations would start on Thursday, the ministry said.
However, Nuh shifted the blame for the delay to Bogor-based printing company PT Ghalia Indonesia Printing, which won the tender for printing and distributing exam materials for the 11 provinces.
"This is solely a technical problem on the part of the printing company," Nuh said in a press conference on Sunday.
Nuh said students could prepare more in the intervening period. He also said that the ministry would cooperate with the Indonesian Air Force (TNI AU) to deliver the exam materials to the 11 provinces to ensure they would be ready by Thursday.
"All materials are ready. We only need to speed up the packaging process," Nuh said.
Meanwhile, Hamzah Lukman, the director for Ghalia Printing Indonesia, said the delay was due to minor problems. Hamzah said that workers at his company had failed to pack all questions and answer sheets on time for delivery.
"This is a technical problem. We have printed the materials for all provinces but we incurred problems while loading them in the right boxes," he said.
He said that although this was the second time his company had won the tender, it had wrongly estimated the time needed to both print and distribute the exam materials. Hamzah said there were now 20 different exam material packages, more than last year's five.
Retno Listyarti, the Indonesian Teachers Unions Federation (FSGI) secretary-general, said the ministry was responsible for the fiasco. "It's the ministry's fault for trusting the company to print and distribute the materials," Retno told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.
Retno suspected that there had been foul play in the tender for the project. "How could this company, without a known reputation, win the tender?" Retno said.
Retno said that this was the worst problem to have ever affected the National Examinations. "There have been times when some provinces did not hold the exam simultaneously with other provinces, but this is definitely the worst," Retno said.
The Indonesian Forum for Budget Transparency (FITRA) previously alleged that irregularities occurred during the tender for the printing and distribution of materials for the national exams that reached Rp 94.8 billion (US$9.76 million).
Responding to the delay, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono posted a message on his official Twitter account @SBYudhoyono on Sunday: "[Regarding] the delay to the start of the national exams in 11 provinces, I have instructed the education and culture minister to immediately resolve and investigate it."
Some local officials have decided to visit Ghalia printing facilities in Bogor to check on the materials themselves.
One of the officials, head of South Sulawesi Education and Culture Agency, Abdullah Jabbar, said he was disappointed with what he found in the city. "The materials are still being packed [in Bogor] and will not be ready to be sent to Makassar today," he said on Sunday.
[Andi Hajramuni and Syamsul Huda M. Suhari contributed to this report from South Sulawesi.]