The change in the distribution of the school operational aid (BOS) fund has not yet answered the classic problem
of late delivery to respective schools, a legislator has said.
Speaking in Bandung on Thursday, a member of the House of Representatives’ Commission X, Hetifah Syaifudian, said of the BOS fund for the 497 regencies/municipalities across the 33 provinces, that only 40.2 percent had been distributed as of Wednesday.
“During the working meeting early this month, National Education Minister Muhammad Nuh said in two weeks the fund would be distributed. In reality, around half of the provinces have received it,” Hetifah said.
She said of the provinces, only three including Yogyakarta had distributed the BOS fund. Three of the provinces, namely East Nusa Tenggara, Papua and West Papua, have not distributed it at all. The rest have partially distributed it.
BOS was first launched by the central government in 2005 as part of the free education program. Schools receiving the funds are no longer allowed to take education funds from the students’ parents.
Previously, the fund was distributed through provincial administrations, then regency/municipal administrations, before finally reaching the designated schools. Complaints over late distribution prompted the House and the government to change the distribution system so that the fund is now directly sent to the regency/municipal administrations.
Hetifah expressed concern that the National Education Ministry seemed to have backed off after transferring the fund, which amounted to Rp 16 trillion, to all the regency/municipal administrations.
“[The ministry] should have monitored the distribution to make sure the fund reached the schools on time,” she said.
Separately in East Kalimantan, students in Samarinda staged a rally on Thursday in protest of the fact that 13 of 14 regencies/municipalities in the province had not distributed the BOS fund. They demanded the city administration conduct the disbursement as soon as possible.
“According to the data we received, the city has yet to disburse the fund despite the fact that the fund was transferred on March 7,” the protesters’ coordinator Isal said.
The combined BOS fund amount for the 14 regencies/municipalities in East Kalimantan is Rp 271.7 billion. So far, only Balikpapan has distributed the Rp 39.3 billion in funds it received for schools.
East Kalimantan Education Agency head Musyahrim said the disbursement process of the fund in each of the regencies/municipalities was still taking place. “It’s completely in the hands of the authority of the respective regency/city administrations,” he said.
He also said that the East Kalimantan governor had briefed all the regency/city administrations in the province on the matter and called on them to distribute the BOS fund promptly.
“It was revealed during the meeting that some of them faced problems including receiving the disbursement fund late,” Musyahrim said. “This is just an administrative matter. Hopefully all will be able to distribute the fund soon.” Previously the central government said it would reduce financial support to 300 regions failing to channel the BOS funds to the schools in their respective regions on time.