The journalist, Prita Kusumaputri, made the demand after another journalist, Agustinus Edy Kristianto, submitted a Facebook post recounting his experience in trying the journalism course.

Agustinus criticized the platform for how it easily issued a certificate for the course, which is not supervised by the Press Council or other credible journalism institutions.

“The course was initially made to share basic knowledge on journalism. [Its inclusion in the pre-employment card program] has made it so that it deviated from its initial purpose,” Prita said on Friday as quoted by tempo.co.

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She said she felt uncomfortable knowing her course was included in a course package designed for preemployment card beneficiaries as she believed her course was not what people needed during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Skill Academy did not ask for her permission before adding the course to the program, she said, explaining that she and the platform initially agreed to include the course in a separate paid program.

“I don’t mind if the users pay with their own money. However, it’s different if a user pays with the preemployment card. We all know the program has been under public scrutiny as it uses the state budget.”

Prita said the journalism course was produced between November and December last year before Ruangguru was named a partner in the government’s program.

The preemployment card program involves 223 training institutions and provides more than 2,000 courses through eight online platforms including Skill Academy, Tokopedia, Bukalapak and Sisnaker.

The government has allocated Rp 20 trillion to cover around 5.6 million people in the program.

Eligible participants will each receive Rp 1 million for online training costs, Rp 2.4 million in incentives for four months, which will only be disbursed if a participant completes a course, and Rp 150,000 if they complete a survey. (aly)