Dinda Shabrina, Jakarta – The Indonesian Education Monitoring Network (JPPI) has criticized President Prabowo Subianto and Vice President Gibran Rakabuming Raka's administration for showing indifference toward millions of children who remain out of school.
In its one-year assessment of the government, JPPI said Indonesia has failed to fulfill its constitutional mandate to provide free basic education for all citizens.
JPPI National Coordinator Ubaid Matraji noted that the government has yet to implement Constitutional Court Decision No. 3/PUU-XXII/2024, which mandates free basic education in all schools – both public and private.
"There are still 4.1 million children in Indonesia who are not attending school, most of them due to economic constraints," Ubaid said in a written statement on Monday, October 20, 2025.
He argued that the situation shows the government is more focused on image-building through populist programs than on meeting its constitutional duties.
Programs such as the Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) initiative, he said, have diverted funds that should have been used to expand education access.
"The government may provide free meals, but if children are not in school, it means the state is feeding ignorance," Ubaid said.
Citing Article 31 of the 1945 Constitution, Ubaid stressed that the state is obligated to fully fund basic education without discrimination.
"What we see now is the government turning a blind eye and allowing poor children to be deprived of their fundamental rights," he added.
JPPI warned that the government's lack of commitment to enforcing the court's ruling is widening inequality in education. Access for children from low-income families is becoming increasingly limited, while tuition fees at private schools continue to rise.
"The state has failed to guarantee every child's constitutional right to learn," Ubaid said.
He urged the administration to realign its education policies with constitutional principles. "If this situation is not corrected, history will remember this government as one that fed its people but left them in ignorance," he remarked.
JPPI emphasized that education is not merely a program but a moral and constitutional responsibility of the state. The government, Ubaid said, must stop treating education as a political project and start upholding it as a basic right of every citizen.
In 2025, the government allocated Rp171 trillion for the MBG program, distributed in stages. The National Nutrition Agency later returned Rp70 trillion in unspent funds.
The 2026 State Budget shows an even larger allocation, amounting to Rp335 trillion for MBG, with Rp223 trillion of that set aside for education.