Over 1,000 Indonesian students may have fallen prey to bogus internships in Germany
- The victims were promised high salaries and study credits but they were paid much less after arriving in Germany
- Investigators are questioning five suspects including an Indonesian academic for their alleged roles in the scam
Some 1,047 students from 33 universities across Indonesia are suspected to have fallen victim to the scam, Indonesia’s national police said last week.
Two Indonesia-based recruitment agencies and two German ones were said to have promised easy, high-paying jobs to students through a three-month internship programme in Germany called ferien jobs, which could later be converted into 20 credits for the students.
The agencies claimed the ferien job scheme was part of the Indonesian education ministry’s Independent Learning Independent Campus programme, or MBKM, which allows university students to take courses and carry out activities outside their studies for two semesters. The education ministry confirmed in October that the internship was not part of the MBKM programme.
“Students are employed non-procedurally, resulting in being exploited,” Brigadier General Djuhandhani Rahardjo Puro, director of the general crimes unit at the Indonesian national police, told reporters on March 20.