Jakarta (Koran Tempo: 16/06/06) The Budget Team of the National Education Ministry found inefficiencies in the use of Rp 3.2 trillion of funds. “We carried out evaluation following suggestion from the Budget Commission of the House of Representatives," National Education Ministry’s Secretary General Dodi Nandika told Tempo last Wednesday.

Earlier, The House of Representatives has conducted an evaluation on the Ministry’s budget. The team set up by the House were questioning about an Rp 5 trillion of education spending which they deemed overlapped among some working units in the ministries.

According to Dodi, inefficiencies in budget realization are due to revisions carried out by various bureaus, additional activities, and relocation of activities between the National Education Ministry and the National education Standardization Agency.

Moreover, some funds were recorded more that once in different directorates as well as some mistakes in the budget revision submitted by bureaus in directorates. Budget deemed inefficient would be transferred to other relevant activities. Among others, school building renovation or providing assistance for victims of the earthquake in Yogyakarta and Central Java.

“We will discuss this further with the House Budget Commission, especially in the revised Ministry’s Budget Working Plan and Budget Ceiling Inventory List," Dodi explained. Deputy Chairman of the House Budget Commission Anwar Arifin said the result of the National Education Ministry’s budget evaluation was not very satisfactory.

“From our previous evaluation, we found inefficiencies totaling Rp 5 trillion, but the Ministry only evaluated Rp 3.2 trillion," Anwar said. Anwar stated that the National Education Ministry’s performance is questionable. "We will conduct further evaluation," Anwar said. He reminded that the main program the Ministry should carry out is the 9-year compulsory education program, including damaged school buildings renovation and teachers’ welfare.