Parents refuse to resign children for bully case

JAKARTA: Parents of three students involved in a recent attack on a freshman in State High School No. 82, South Jakarta, have refused to remove their children from the school, a school official says.

"Their parents insisted they would work hard to ensure that their children wouldn't make the same mistakes until graduation," vice principal M. Endang Supardi told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.

Earlier this month, 10th-grader Ade Fauzan Mahfuza, 15, had to be taken to Pertamina Hospital after seniors attacked him for crossing a "restricted" hallway in front of a classroom for 12th-graders.

Ade had been in the corridor in the early morning to pick up a book left in a classroom where he had taken an exam the previous day.

During recess later in the day, several 12th-graders asked him whether he had walked down the corridor that morning. Two then slapped his face and left.

After school finished, a dozen seniors waited out front for Ade, where they beat him until he lost consciousness.

Ade had to have six stitches in his mouth and sustained several injuries to his head and arms, leading his mother to report the case to the Kebayoran Baru Police.

The school has suspended 14 seniors until next month for their alleged involvement in the case.

Among the suspended students, three, who had allegedly plotted the attack, were also told to resign and find another school.

The school management have repeatedly said to settle the case without getting anyone sent to jail.

Last year, the Indonesian Commission for Child Protection received 86 reports of violence in schools, a significant drop from the 555 reports received in 2007. - JP