Despite strong protest from the House of Representatives, the government has insisted it will allow students who failed their final exams in certain schools to retake their papers.

When interrogated by the House of Representatives’ Commission X on education and religious affairs in a hearing in Jakarta on Monday, Education Minister Bambang Sudibyo said the final exams held in April at the 36 junior and senior high schools where every student failed were originally invalid.

He said because the April exams breached several regulations, an “alternative” paper would be taken by the students.

“We will not repeat any exams, because the first ones were not appropriate in the first place.”

Many legislators at the hearing questioned Bambang’s decision to carry out plans for a second round of examinations, largely because no regulation exists that deals with “repeat exams”.

Legislator Maria Margaretha argued that both an “alternative” or “repeat” paper would essentially serve the same purpose for students. She suggested instead that the minister conduct remedial tests, named package program C (Paket C), for all students that failed regardless of whether they cheated or not.

“I think that would be the best solution, as no students who cheated will benefit and no honest students will be robbed.”

Besides, Maria added, Paket C was outlined in the national education law, where neither an “alternative” or “repetition” of the exams was mentioned.

“So we don’t need to worry about legal issues.”

Bambang disagreed, saying “If we don’t conduct alternative exams, that would be unfair for honest students.”

His answer did not seem to satisfy commission members.

“How can you determine which ones are honest students and which are not, anyway?” legislator Munawar Sholeh asked.

“If there is no clear criteria for determining whether final school exams are invalid or not, other schools will possibly seek the same treatment for their failed students,” the commission’s chief Irwan Prayitno added.

The minister was bombarded with similar questions, eventually appearing frustrated.

“Okay. If you do not want alternative exams, fine by me, but you have to declare to the public that it was the decision of legislators, not the government.

“I don’t want the public to blame us for having sacrificed honest students because of a political

decision.”

Munawar replied that Bambang could not “wash his hands” of the failure surrounding the exams, adding the House could have held an internal meeting without government representatives to devise

a policy.

“Please understand that this problem is not easy,” Bambang said. “We are sure that violations have been committed in several schools, but it’s hard to prove who is responsible.”

Bambang said violations occurred in several ways before the exams, with answers circulated via SMS, question papers leaked and answer sheets distributed.

“It’s not easy to investigate them one by one. Even the police have not yet  named suspects in a number of regions.”(bbs)

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