Indonesia’s Jakarta High Court has reduced former education minister Nadiem Makarim’s prison sentence to nine years while leaving his graft conviction intact.
The appellate judges declined to clear Makarim of charges arising from the procurement of Google Chromebooks for schools. The trial court had found that tender requirements were adjusted in a way that favoured the Chrome platform, restricted competition and contributed to state losses calculated at roughly $125 million.
Makarim, a co-founder of the ride-hailing company Gojek, was sentenced in June to ten years. The high court cut one year from that term and reduced the restitution order from 809 billion rupiah to 548 billion rupiah. The judgment did not disturb the central factual findings supporting the conviction.
His lawyers had sought a broader reversal. After the hearing, Makarim said he would challenge the result in the Supreme Court, describing the case as a test of the credibility of Indonesian law enforcement.
The ruling is therefore an appellate judgment, but not necessarily the final procedural step. Unless the Supreme Court intervenes, the conviction stands on the record as affirmed with a reduced sentence and financial order. A further appeal could address the legal basis of the conviction, the treatment of the procurement evidence or the relief ordered below.
The distinction matters: Thursday’s decision did not exonerate Makarim, and it did not simply confirm the original punishment. It preserved the finding of criminal responsibility while recalibrating its consequences.
