PPIM survey: nationalism dimension in religious education curriculum requires the DPR attention

Jakarta, UIN News Online – The legislative members and political parties were asked to pay more attention to the nationalism dimension in religious education curriculum. This is based on their low attention to the national dimension of religious education curriculum. Moreover, the legislature and political parties have a strategic role in regulating public life.

That was the conclusion of the PPIM UIN Jakarta and Convey Indonesia survey titled “Suara dari Senayan: Pandangan Wakil Rakyat tentang Peran Negara dalam Pendidikan Agama”. The results of the survey itself were launched in Jakarta, Wednesday (02/05/2020).

Sirojuddin Arif, researcher from PPIM UIN Jakarta said, the survey recorded a relatively small proportion of the Indonesian Parliament members who paid an attention to national and diversity issues in religious education. Only a few members of the Indonesian House of Representatives pay attention to issues concerning nationalism, access to certain groups to include their religious views in the curriculum of national religious education, and understanding religious diversity in religious education.

Of the 370 Parliament members who responded to the survey, only 47 percent said that there were problems in the religious education curriculum. The rest, 53 percent did not see any problems in the curriculum.

Of the 47 percent of respondents who saw a problem, only 19.46 percent considered the lack of providing a national insight in religious education as a serious problem. Even lower percentages were recorded by respondents who considered the lack of understanding of diversity in Indonesia at 12.16 percent of the total respondents.

Such condition, said Sirojuddin, demanded that the legislators to be more actively involved in the preparation of nationalism dimension in religious education curriculum. This requires the relevant commission to be more active in conducting dialogues with different groups on issues of nationality and diversity. “Particularly related to the role of the DPR in maintaining diversity and national unity,” he said.

The same role must also be contributed by various political parties by providing cadres in parliament who have the awareness and understanding of the importance of religious education with national dimensions.

 "Without the active role of the legislature to oversee the direction of government policy and the effects, it will be difficult for this country to overcome the problems caused by religious intolerance," he added.

The survey itself was took place from October 1 to December 17, 2019. The survey conducted face to face succeeded in interviewing 380 members of the DPR or equivalent to 68.1 percent of the total population. To guarantee data quality, research uses a spot check mechanism for 100% of data retrieved. In addition, from the total data obtained, 10 data are considered incomplete so that the total data analyzed is only 370 data. (usa/zm)