Indonesia's court orders education budget separated from school meals program by 2028

Indonesia's Constitutional Court has drawn a line in the sand—or tried to. On Thursday, the court ruled that the country's Free Nutritious Meals program, known as MBG, can no longer be funded from the national education budget. The decision gives the government until 2028 to separate the two funding streams, a deadline that educators and advocates are already treating with skepticism.

The case began when students and educators filed petitions against this year's state budget, arguing that the government had essentially borrowed from schools to feed children. The numbers tell the story: Indonesia's education budget sits at roughly $61.5 billion, and the meals program was consuming nearly a third of it. Under the constitution, at least 20 percent of the state budget must go to education. The government was technically meeting that requirement—just barely, at 20.1 percent—but only by counting meal spending as educational expenditure. If you removed the MBG money, education funding would plummet to about 14 percent, well below the legal floor.

Chief Judge Suhartoyo's ruling acknowledged the tension: the meals program, launched in 2025 to feed 83 million school children and expectant mothers, serves a vital purpose. But it is not education spending. The court found that while the current arrangement did not technically breach the constitution this year, it cannot continue. The education budget must be freed to do what it is supposed to do—pay for school facilities, teacher salaries, classroom learning, and scholarships.

Yet the victory feels incomplete to those who fought for it. Iman Zanatul Haeri, head of teacher advocacy at the Education and Teachers' Association, called the ruling "a grey area." The government, he suggested, will likely use the two-year window to tinker with the program rather than truly separate the funding. "We also know that even in the best-case scenario there is no guarantee that the government will implement the ruling," he told ABC Indonesia. Another petitioner, Rega Felix, framed it differently: the ruling means the education budget "can no longer be interfered with by the MBG program." But he too noted the ambiguity. The court allowed the current arrangement to stand through 2026, then required separation by 2028—a timeline that could be stretched, reinterpreted, or simply ignored.

The stakes are concrete. According to research by the Institute for Demographic and Affluence, the money currently spent on meals could instead provide free basic education for all Indonesian children, scholarships for nearly 3 million low-income university students, and salary increases for more than 2 million contract teachers. The Indonesian Teachers Association reported that at least 700,000 contract teachers work on temporary contracts, with 74 percent earning less than $170 a month. Some earn as little as $11. In Dompu, West Nusa Tenggara, contract teachers make just $11 monthly—a figure that speaks to the desperation of the education system itself.

The government has promised to respect the court's decision. Minister of State Secretariat Prasetyo Hadi said the ruling would be reviewed, though he cautioned that budget decisions involve parliament and take time. A ruling coalition MP, Yahya Zaini, suggested the National Nutrition Agency could find efficiency gains—refocusing spending, limiting new kitchen construction, improving governance. But the agency itself has been under fire. Its former head faced corruption allegations. His successor resigned. Hundreds of kitchens have closed. The government has cut the program's budget twice and hinted at more cuts.

Haeri sees a pattern. The agency's sudden improvements during the court proceedings looked less like genuine reform and more like damage control. "They should have been conducting evaluations without needing to be challenged first," he said. The real problem, he argued, is that the MBG was flawed from the start—a well-intentioned program built on a constitutional shortcut. Now the court has ordered the shortcut closed. Whether the government actually builds a proper road remains to be seen.