Kupang students consume alcohol after announcement

Hundreds of senior high school students celebrate passing the national exams in Kupang, East Nusa Tenggara, by consuming alcohol and spray painting their school uniforms on Saturday.

Some of the students drank alcohol at a bus shelter in front of a Bank Mandiri office on Jl. El Tari, while others drank elsewhere. A number of students seemed to be staggering.

“A number of friends and I made a promise to celebrate our success, if we passed the National Exams, by drinking alcohol together,” vocational school student Viktor Lasi said on Saturday.

“We had struggled for the exams for almost a year, and we deserve to celebrate it.”

Students also painted their faces to express their relief after they passed the exam.

Around 1,000 male and female senior high school and vocational school students gathered in Kupang’s main streets and strategic places for a group ride on motorcycles or in cars following the announcement made at 11 a.m. local time (9 a.m. Jakarta time).

Students who passed the exam immediately collected signatures on their uniforms and rushed to the street for a group ride.

The group ride, which caused queues of vehicles up to 2 kilometers, passed Jl. W.J. Lalamentik, Jl.Thamrin, Jl. Soeharo and Jl. Urip Sumoharjo, among other main streets.

A number of police officers were deployed in several spots to prevent brawls.

East Nusa Tenggara remained at the bottom compared to other provinces in the country in terms of graduation rate, with 94.50 percent of the 36,228 senior high school, vocational school and Islamic high school Madrasah Aliyah students who took part in the exams, although it posted an increase of 0.7 percentage point from the previous year. (mtq)