Education Ministry: MBG Paper Listed Several Names Without Consent

August 7, 2026 | 03:29 pm

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Ministry of Higher Education, Science, and Technology (Kemendiktisaintek) has announced that the listing of President Prabowo Subianto and several other parties' names in a scientific paper on Free Nutritious Meals (MBG) was carried out without their consent. The paper uploaded to the SSRN platform has drawn attention because it suggested MBG as a candidate for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize.

The Education Ministry has formed a special investigative team to investigate the paper entitled "Nobel Peace Prize 2026 Free Meal Program by the National Nutrition Agency" since Tuesday, August 4, 2026. The team has also confirmed several names listed in the paper.

"Based on the results of coordination with several parties whose names are listed in the paper, it was obtained that they were not aware of, were never asked for approval, and were not involved in the process of compiling or uploading the paper in question," said the ministry in a press release on Friday, August 7, 2026.

According to the ministry, the findings align with information from the main author's campus. That information stated that the main author, identified as DD, apologized for the incident. Furthermore, the Education Ministry claimed that DD does not yet hold a professorship and is not affiliated with any university as a lecturer.

"Based on information obtained by the team, the person concerned had just undergone a doctoral promotion hearing some time ago," the statement read.

In the same statement, the ministry also explained that the SSRN platform is not an authorized institution in the Nobel Prize process. It is a repository or preprint publication platform where researchers share scientific manuscripts.

Therefore, the presence of a paper in SSRN does not necessarily mean that its contents or claims have been verified or recognized by the Nobel Committee. Furthermore, the ministry stated that using the term "nomination" in a paper title does not imply an official Nobel Prize nomination.

According to the Education Ministry, the Nobel Prize nomination process has its own mechanisms implemented by authorized parties. The identities of the nominees and their nominations are also kept confidential by the Nobel Committee for 50 years.

"Thus, the presence of a paper in SSRN cannot be used as proof that someone has received an official Nobel Prize nomination," wrote the ministry.

Furthermore, the ministry, led by Minister Brian Yuliarto, claims that simply including someone's name in a paper on SSRN does not necessarily indicate that they have knowledge or consent to be an author. This is because author information is entered by the party uploading the manuscript.

This misappropriation is considered an ethical issue in scientific publications that must be clarified and followed up in accordance with regulations. The ministry confirmed that the investigation is ongoing. The results of the investigation will be made public once the full investigation and clarification process is complete.

Sultan Abdurrahman contributed to this article

Read: Indonesia Probes Academic Paper on MBG Listing Prabowo as Author

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