Yogyakarta Won't Reopen Schools despite Nadiem Makarim's Green Light
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12 August 2020 08:21 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Yogyakarta - Yogyakarta Governor Sri Sultan Hamengku Buwono (Sultan HB X) would not yet allow the reopening of schools amid the COVID-19 pandemic despite Education and Culture Minister Nadiem Makarim giving the green light.
Sultan argued that his province still saw high COVID-19 positive cases from July until August 2020, which made it difficult to set the zone map as a benchmark to measure the safety of holding face-to-face learning activities.
“We will not open schools yet because the condition [the number of positive cases] still fluctuates, and we don’t know whether Yogyakarta has entered a green, yellow, or even orange zone,” said Sultan on Tuesday, August 11.
He was determined to not risk the fate of the children by allowing school reopening. Moreover, the emergency response period for COVID-19 in the province has not been lifted yet and is still valid until the end of August.
“The risk for the children is too high, let schools be the last for reopening, we don’t want to try it,” he remarked.
Instead of allowing schools to reopen, Sultan HB X preferred to increase the swab testing capacity on people who presented COVID-19 symptoms in an effort to immediately cut off virus transmission.
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PRIBADI WICAKSONO (CONTRIBUTOR)
