Depok-Three students from the Universitas Indonesia (UI) won Third Place in the Fantaxtis competition at the 2024 SMARTAX competition. They consist of Romario Hadamean Azka Harahap, Joshua Steven Bathry Hutagalung, and Muhammad Reza Nursabaryansyah who are students of the Tax Administration study program, Vocational Education Program.
SMARTAX 2024, which carries the theme “Gasak Strategy (Tax Aware Generation) in Realizing the Sustainability Development Goals 2030” is a platform that provides an opportunity for students to play an active role as agents of change in realizing various Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 through participation in the competition.
Vice Director for Education, Research, and Student Affairs, Deni Danial Kesa, Ph.D, said that the achievements of Joshua and his team are proof that UI Vocational students have high competence and fighting spirit in facing challenges in the academic and professional world. “Their success in the SMARTAX Fantaxtis 2024 competition not only makes UI proud, but also shows the great potential of Indonesia’s young generation in contributing to the achievement of SDGs 2030,” said Deni.
UI Vocational students who are members of the Geblek Renteng Team managed to show brilliant performance during the competition. When the announcement of participants who qualified for the final round, Joshua and his team were in second place out of six teams that advanced to the final round. The Fantaxtis competition branch consists of three rounds, namely the initial round in the form of multiple choice questions, the semifinal round in the form of case studies, and the final round which is divided into two phases, namely fast and precise, and debate.
(Photo: Competition process for Tax Administration study program students in the 2024 SMARTAX competition)
“After successfully making it to the final round, we were faced with a debate round with the motion ‘Government Policy Direction Focusing on VAT rather than Income Tax’ and got a pro position on the motion. We tried to give our best through the opinions and data that we researched during the debate,” said Joshua. He also added that the team studied all materials (all taxes) with a proportional division to make the material load more efficient.
The competition organized by the Tax Community of the Faculty of Economics and Business, Universitas Pekalongan, was held from May to July 2024 and was attended by 36 teams from various universities in Indonesia. This activity aims to provide an understanding of tax awareness for the younger generation in realizing the 2030 SDGs. Various competitions were held, including posters, tax video challenges, articles, and Fantaxtis.
The SMARTAX 2024 activity was closed with a tax seminar and announcement of various competitions, including achievements of UI Vocational students. “We are very happy to be able to represent UI in a national competition like this. In the future, we will continue to strive to make our alma mater proud and achieve, especially in the field of taxation,” said Joshua.
