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ogyakarta: The idea for the establishment of a school to train political party cadres has received a warm welcome from academics, who say that the school could help breed reliable national leaders.

Indonesian Islamic University (UII) rector Edy Suandi Hamid said on Sunday he hoped the “Party School” should be more than a training center, which many political parties have operated.

“The school should be a structured institution with tight evaluation both during the learning process and after graduation,” Edy said, responding to the idea to setup the political school.

The idea was put forward by Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) politician Idham Samawi, who wrote an article published by Yogyakarta-based newspaper Kedaulatan Rakyat.

Idham’s idea for the establishment of a “Party School” was driven by his concerns over the declining quality of political cadres.

He said that political parties should be able to produce qualified cadres that would take strategic positions at national or regional levels. To have qualified cadres, Idham said, political parties needed to improve their political recruitment strategies.

UII rector Edy said the party school needed to develop a curriculum to produce more qualified and mature politicians.

“The idea for the establishment of this school can start with a specific aspect and later be expanded to cover other issues,” said Edy, as quoted by Antara.