Shadows Of Corruption Behind The Learning Digitization Program

JAKARTA The digital interactive panel procurement project (IFP) of the Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education has reopened the bitter experience of procuring Chromebooks that dragged Nadiem Makarim to court.

President Prabowo Subianto has just launched the Learning Digitization program. This program is marked by the delivery of digital interactive panels to 173,000 schools. According to the plan, there are more than 288,000 panels that will be channeled to support learning digitization.

In his launch speech, President Prabowo explained that the learning digitization program was carried out to accelerate the transformation of national education. The President said that Indonesia still has many shortcomings in the education sector.

Even though it was wrapped in noble intentions to advance education in the country, the Learning Digitization program, which focused on the procurement of goods, actually reopened the potential for corruption in the world of education.

Education observer Ina Liem said that the procurement of the IPF, which is actually not what many recipient schools need, is an irregularity.

Meanwhile, the Coordinator of the Indonesian Education Monitoring Network (JPPI) Ubaid Matraji revealed that many schools felt confused and even traumatized by this program. According to Ubaid, the procurement of digital interactive panels to schools is like an old song that has been played again.

The public must still remember when the Attorney General's Office named the former Minister of Education, Culture, Research and Technology (Mendikbudristek) Nadiem Makarim as a suspect in the corruption case in the procurement of a Chromebook laptop last September.

This project is part of the 2019-2022 Education Digitization Program with a total budget of IDR 9.9 trillion. This case cost the state IDR 1.98 trillion and dragged a total of five suspects.

In this case, the results of the examination stated that Nadiem encouraged Chromebooks to be released in the procurement of information and communication technology (ICT) tools that were distributed to schools. Even though this was rejected by the previous ministers because the trials conducted in 2019 showed Chromebooks failed to be used in a number of areas, especially for schools in frontier, outermost, and underdeveloped areas or 3T.

And, when the procurement of interactive digital panels, or what is often called the Tvmart distributed by the Ministry of Education and Culture this year, the public again remembers the Chromebook procurement case. The procurement of digital learning facilities in the form of IFP, laptops, learning content storage media (external HDD) seems to be associated with Presidential Instruction Number 7 of 2025. Whereas in the Presidential Instruction there is no explicit direction for IFP procurement.

Education observer Ina Liem smells anomalies in the procurement. This large policy was carried out without documents to identify needs, without surveys, without mapping school readiness, and without an adequate framework for activity reference. This direct procurement decision, which was allegedly without a study of needs, was considered a serious anomaly in the governance of education spending.

Ina Liem said that the initial findings regarding the distribution of digital interactive panel devices were deemed not to suit the needs of many recipient schools.

Even Ina admitted that her party received information from various schools, especially the Cooperation Education Unit (SPK) school, which received the device even though it already had a better interactive panel.

There was a school that contacted me. They said this was not on target because each class already had a much more expensive and better panel. But still sent one IPF unit and should not refuse," he said.

Even a number of elite schools to international schools that already use similar devices with premium brands, are still being sent by the government.

Another anomaly of this procurement is the distribution targeting kindergarten levels. In fact, this level is among those who do not need the screen digital device at least.

TK is the age of exploration. We are reducing the use of monitors for early childhood, but instead IPF sent it. That's 100 percent unnecessary," he said.

JPPI National Coordinator Ubaid Matraji said that the procurement of interactive panels did not answer the real root of the problem.

In my opinion, the smell of the project is very pungent than strengthening its digital literacy. Digital literacy is the next step after mastering basic literacy. So, after the basic literacy is strong, then you can go to the next stage, namely digital literacy," said Ubaid.

The basic literacy condition of students in Indonesia is still very worrying. Even in some areas, high school students are still found who have not been able to read. This shows that basic literacy has not yet become a strong foundation in the education system.

The problem becomes even more complex because of the reality in the field, this problem also occurs among teachers as the main facilitator of the teaching and learning process.

"So what is more important and urgent is not a digitalization program, it should strengthen basic literacy. JPPI noted that this low basic literacy was triggered by poor teacher basic literacy. The 2 trillion figure is a big number and the impact will be great if it is used to strengthen basic literacy for students and teachers," he said.

With conditions like this, the learning digitization program has the potential to be a fake solution because it does not see facts on the ground. JPPI also doubts the effectiveness of this program, because of previous experience, digital projects in the education sector often lead to corruption cases.

Ubaid also said that the procurement of smart Tvke schools was like an old song that was played again. Not only throwing away the budget, but the government is also considered to have no educational perspective in managing education. Not to mention there is a gap in corruption due to the closed procurement method without tender.

The government has no educational perspective in managing education. I'm afraid we fell into the same hole," he said.