TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Education and Culture Minister Nadiem Makarim hoped the country’s two largest Islamic organizations, Muhammadiyah and Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), and the Indonesian Teachers Association (PGRI) would again join the ministry’s program involving communities and organizations dubbed the Mobilization Organization Program (POP).

He acknowledged that the three organizations are the government’s strategic partners and their huge contribution to national education even long before the country was established.

“I apologize for any convenience this has caused,” said Nadiem in a video recording published on Monday, July 28.

Nadiem pinned hopes the three organizations would stay guiding the implementation of the program, realizing the POP was far from perfect.

Previously reported, Muhammadiyah, NU, and PGRI withdrew from the ministry’s program. The PGRI Head Unifah Rosyidi said that as suggested by the organization management in regions, her side decided to withdraw from the POP based on some considerations.

Unifah argued that the fund allocated for the Minister Nadiem Makarim’s program would be beneficial to help students and teachers or honorary teachers, and provide them infrastructures, especially in disadvantage, frontier, and outermost regions in order to support online or distance learning program (PJJ) amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

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AHMAD FAIZ IBNU SANI