Copyright by World Economic Forum / Sikarin Thanachaiary
An Indonesian court has sentenced Nadiem Makarim, co-founder of Gojek and former education minister, to 10 years in prison on corruption charges.
The 41-year-old denies the charges, asserting political motivation – a claim backed by academics and rights activists, News.Az reports, citing The Independent.
Makarim, education minister from 2019 to 2024, was accused of profiting from the government’s purchase of Google Chromebook laptops for schools, causing $125 million in state losses.
The verdict could further undermine investor confidence in Indonesia. The rupiah and stocks have slumped this year after credit ratings agencies cut outlooks, citing unpredictable policymaking and governance.
MSCI is also weighing whether to downgrade Southeast Asia’s biggest economy due to market transparency issues.
Chief Judge Purwanto Abdullah, at Indonesia’s Corruption Court in Jakarta, confirmed judges found Makarim guilty of abuse of authority and causing state losses. He was acquitted of directly seeking personal enrichment.
Makarim was ordered to pay 1 billion rupiah in fines and to return over 800 billion rupiah ($45 million) that the judges said was an amount he personally gained from the deal.
Failing to return the money would add another five years to his prison sentence, the judges said.
Flanked by family and friends, Nadiem said he would appeal the verdict.
“I was sentenced with facts that don’t make any sense,” Makarim said tearfully after the trial, adding he could not pay the amount ordered by the judges. “The judges couldn’t even look me in the eye.”
Prosecutors alleged that Google’s investment in Gojek’s parent company influenced the procurement decision and that Makarim created tender specifications that only fit the Chrome system to “make Google the sole controller of the education ecosystem in Indonesia”.
Google was not indicted.
Makarim has rejected the allegations, saying there was no personal enrichment and that Google’s investment in Gojeck’s parent company was not connected to the procurement.
He has said the case is likely motivated by sweeping reforms he carried out during his time as education minister that cut into long-established corruption opportunities such as “training rackets, middlemen and budget leakage”, while acknowledging that his leadership style at the time had ruffled feathers.