Ministries and state institutions that were given “red marks” by a presidential evaluation team for poor performance in implementing the national development priority programs in the first half of the year claimed they performed relatively well.
The Justice and Human Rights Ministry, the Public Works Ministry, and the Communications and Information Technology Ministry, which were among the government institutions receiving red marks, each said only one of the dozens of their projects included in the evaluation received poor marks.
The evaluation results were announced Thursday by Kuntoro Mangkusubroto who heads the Presidential Work Unit for Development Monitoring and Control (UKP4), which monitored the implementation of the 2010 presidential directive on the acceleration of the 2010 national development priority programs.
Justice and Human Rights Ministry spokesman Marwan Batubara said only one out of its 11 projects included in the evaluation failed to meet the target.
“Our program to build 19 new penitentiaries did not reach the target, but that is because the decision to disburse money for the program was not finalized. And this was related to the process of the [2010] state budget revision,” Batubara told The Jakarta Post over the weekend.
He added the ministry’s 10 other projects met the targets, including those on improving passport services for Indonesian migrant workers, empowering prisoners, and granting clemency for underage inmates. “We’ve been performing very well so far,” he said.
Public Works Ministry spokesman Amwazi Idrus echoed Batubara’s statements, saying that form the ministry’s more than a dozen projects, only the establishment of an institution to manage government and private sector partnerships received red marks.
“That particular project was derailed because it was not approved in the state budget revision. Other projects were judged as being acceptable, which means they are on track to meet the targets, or have even surpassed the targets,” he told the Post.
Communications and Information Technology Ministry spokesman Gatot Dewa Broto said his ministry’s only project that failed was the e-education pilot project that was supposed to take place in Yogyakarta.
“It was scheduled to begin in June, but we could only start in July,” Gatot said.
Kuntoro said that of the 369 sub-action plans under 14 sectors enlisted in this year’s national priority development programs, 49 were judged “disappointing”.
He said these 49 plans were the responsibility of a quarter of the 45 ministries and government institutions included in the evaluation.
Mohammad Qodari from political survey institute Indobarometer suggested that President Susilo Bamabang Yudhoyono should use the evaluation results to assess the performance of members of his Cabinet to assess whether a minister or head of an institution should retain their post after a year on the job.
As they have only been working for nine months now, it is understood that no consequences apply for good or poor performing institutions, he added.
“This sort of evaluation is effective in that ministries can get input regarding the job they’re doing,” Qodari said.
