Nadya Natahadibrata and Margareth S. Aritonang, Jakarta – After delaying the exam in 11 provinces at the 11th hour due to printing problem, the Education and Culture Ministry face complaints from students and teachers in provinces where the examination began as scheduled on Monday.

Indonesian Teachers Association chairman Sulistyo said they had received mountains of complaints from teachers everywhere on the first day of the exam.

Some schools in Aceh, Riau and West Sumatra had insufficient question sheets, so teachers copied the sheets themselves in order to keep the exam on schedule.

"Schools that were short of question sheets started the exams at 9 a.m., or 1.5 hours behind schedule," Rokan Hilir Education Agency chief Surya Arfan said on Monday. "This obviously affects the students' psychological condition. The government should be held responsible if the students end up failing the exam," he added.

Sulistyo added that the poor quality of the answering sheets had also put students in jeopardy. "The answer sheets are very thin, so when students erase their answers, the printing is also erased and the paper gets torn. Students are really having a hard time in this year's exam," Sulistyo told The Jakarta Post.

Ministry spokesperson Ibnu Hamad said on Monday that the ministry had received 276 reports, protests and information requests. "The reports are mostly about the 11 provinces in central part of the country that failed to start on time, but also about the poor quality of answer sheets," Ibnu told reporters on Monday.

He said that the students should not worry about ripped answer sheets as the ministry would form a special team to examine the matter. "As for the shortages of question sheets, we have instructed schools to make copies of the sheets themselves," Ibnu said.

Around 1.1 million students from 5,109 schools, including senior high schools, madrasah aliyah (Islamic high school) and vocational high schools in Bali, East Nusa Tenggara, West Nusa Tenggara, South Kalimantan, East Kalimantan, Gorontalo, North Sulawesi, West Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, Southeast Sulawesi and Central Sulawesi, failed to sit exams on Monday.

Education and Culture Minister Mohammad Nuh said that the delay was due to technical problems with the printing company, PT Ghalia Indonesia Printing, which failed to pack all the question and answer sheets on time.

Deputy House speaker Pramono Anung said that the delay showed lack of seriousness from the minister in organizing the exam, saying that the technical problems could not be blamed for the incident.

"This shows the ministry's poor management, while the state has allocated 20 percent of its budget for them," Pramono said. "It is very regrettable that even with so much budget, the ministry still has this petty problem."

Nuh expressed his regrets, saying that this year's examination was not just a test for the students, but also for the ministry. "We learned a lesson from this incident. Whatever happens, the company that wins the tender should be ready. We will blacklist PT. Ghaila from the national exam tender," he told reporters on Monday.

Separately, Amin Priatna, from the ministry's inspectorate general said that auditors would be sent to each province to investigate the problems.

"We will investigate all the printing companies, especially Ghalia," Amin said. "The ministry had actually done everything they could to ensure the exam goes well. The public must understand that we have our limitations," he added.

The first day of the exam in Jakarta went well with no reports of irregularity, according to city police spokesman Sr. Comr. Rikwanto.

"The police were committed to guard the national exam. One or two officers are assigned to each school and stay there just in case there is any misconduct during the four days," he said. (hae)

[Rizal Harahap and Apriadi Gunawan contributed from Pekanbaru and Medan.]