TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Director General (Dirjen) of Village Government (Pemdes) of the Ministry of Home Affairs (Kemendagri), La Ode Ahmad P. Bolombo, stated that the Village Governance and Development Strengthening Program (P3PD) has significantly reduced the training time for village officials. P3PD has succeeded in cutting down the time needed for capacity building of village officials by decades.

For instance, the implementation of capacity building for village officials in East Java (Jatim). La Ode explained that according to the Head of the Village Community Empowerment Service (PMD) of East Java Province, the East Java Regional Budget (APBD) could only fund the training of 500 village officials annually.

"Through P3PD, East Java was able to train 15,000 village officials. That’s 15,000:500, or 30 times. Meaning P3PD has shortened 30 years of training time for village officials in East Java," he said during the closing ceremony of the capacity building event for village officials and village institution administrators in Banda Aceh, Aceh Province, on Wednesday, October 16, 2024.

During the event, La Ode praised the village officials' training in Aceh, which showed remarkable commitment by sending the largest number of participants in 2024, even surpassing the provinces in Java. He hoped that participants would continue to enhance their knowledge through the Learning Management System (LMS) online learning platform.

"I hope our friends in Aceh can study through LMS. To do so, villages in Aceh must be connected to the internet," he explained.

In addition to focusing on improving village officials' capacity, he emphasized that the connection between the central government, local governments, and villages must also be strengthened. "Don’t let the higher levels operate on FM frequency while the lower levels are on AM. The higher-ups need to tone it down a bit, and the lower levels need to step up, so they can meet," he added.

Meanwhile, the Director of Cooperation Facilitation, Village Government Institutions, and Village Consultative Bodies at the Directorate General of Village Government, Murtono, stated that the attendance rate of participants in Aceh reached 98.94%, or 17,559 participants. Over 99% of the villages were involved in the training.

"Moving forward, village officials, whether they've attended training or not, can continue learning through LMS," he added. (*)

INFO TEMPO