Management of Education Budgets in Various Ministries Needs to Be Organized

Deputy Chairman of Commission

In the General Hearing Meeting of the Working Committee (Panja) on Education Financing, Commission

PRAKARSA (2024) highlighted the Mandatory Spending commitment based on the 1945 Constitution article 31 paragraph 4 which requires an allocation of 20% of the APBN for education. However, the education budget is spread across various ministries such as the Ministry of PUPR (0,51%), Ministry of Finance (0,49%), Ministry of Defense (0,43%), Ministry of Transportation (0,36%), and non-K /L of 7,11%.

Bintang Aulia Luthfi, Researcher at The PRAKARSA said that the education budget spread across various ministries and institutions could also result in inefficient use of the education budget.

"Budget efficiency is very important, where the education budget should be more focused on developing education programs in the Ministry of Education and transferring them to regions rather than being spread across other ministries which also create education programs at large costs," said Bintang. On Thursday (4/7/2024).

Not only that, education that is managed other than the ministry of education is mostly carried out by the private sector. Indonesia has a large number of private school students. According to the Central Statistics Agency (2023), around 83% of schools under the Ministry of Religion are private schools.

Different from private schools in general, private schools in Indonesia are not only luxury schools for the rich. However, many of them are poor private schools with very minimal facilities. There are also private schools which are managed by community organizations (such as religious organizations for example).

“The large number of private schools under the Ministry of Religion are not all luxury schools. Many private schools also serve the poorer classes. "Therefore, it is important for the government to ensure that the privatization of education does not ignore the educational needs of the poor and continues to provide access to quality education for all levels of society," said Bintang.

Reliance on private education poses challenges regarding financing, affordability, and quality assurance. The burden of education costs also weighs heavily on households and students, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds.

“The government must develop budget allocation criteria for education projects and ensure balanced investment between infrastructure and operational needs to avoid non-transparency and inefficiency in budget use. "Apart from that, the government can increase tax revenues by increasing the Minimum Global Tax Rate to 25% for ASEAN so that it can encourage higher budget allocations for this sector," concluded Bintang.

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