1st Congress in Surakarta. Attempts were made to unify all Scout organizations into one. The fact that Indonesia is made up of many islands made administration and supervision difficult, and the Japanese occupation caused some twenty separate Scout organizations to spring up, and it took time for them to coalesce. In September 1951, in a Jakarta conference, the People's Scouts, recognized by the Ministry of Education twice in 1947 and 1950 as the official Scout organization of the young nation, and the other 12 of the stronger Scout and Guide organizations nationwide met and decided to found a federating body to satisfy national and international needs. Representatives of these organizations decided that the time had come to merge into one national organization for Indonesian Scouting and Guiding. With their cooperation, the Ikatan Pandu Indonesia (Ipindo, Indonesian Scouting Union) came into being. Government approval of Ipindo was granted on 22 February 1952, and President Sukarno consented to become patron of the unifying and correlating National Scout Council. With the formation of Ipindo, Indonesia became a full member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1953 as an organization of its Asia-Pacific Region. In 1955 the Ipindo hosted the country's first Scout Jamboree in Pasar Minggu, South Jakarta. With the beginning of the Guided Democracy period came a period of unification of all Scout and Guide organizations into one. On 9 March 1961, in the State Palace of Jakarta, in the presence of Ipinido representatives and those of other organizations, President Sukarno gave his blessing for the unification of Indonesian Scouting and Guiding into one national organization. With the April 1961 decision to merge the Fadjar Harapan Pioneer movement organization (founded in 1959) into Ipindo and other organizations, the establishment of a single Scout Movement organization in Indonesia called "Gerakan Pramuka" was officially completed. On 20 May 1961, President Sukarno signed a presidential regulation formally declaring Gerakan Pramuka as the official Scout and Guide organization in Indonesia and official heir and successor to the legacies of the former Scout and Guide organizations of the republic, inheriting thus Indonesia's membership in WOSM from Ipindo. On 30 July, at the Istora Gelora Bung Karno in Jakarta, the GPI was officially launched as the country's national co-ed Scouting and Guiding organization on the basis of the existing organizations in the republic. Gerakan Pramuka is a former member of the World Association of Girl