Judge rules Kemendikbudristek Chromebook procurement benefited Google

The Jakarta Corruption Court has ruled that the procurement of Chromebooks and Chrome Device Management (CDM) within the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology (Kemendikbudristek) for the 2019-2022 period was intended to benefit Google. Presiding Judge Purwanto Abdullah stated during a hearing in Central Jakarta on Tuesday that the objective of benefiting Google as a corporation was evident from a series of strategic meetings between defendant Nadiem Makarim, during his tenure as minister, and Google executives from the very start of his term. According to the panel of judges, the Google entities involved included Google Asia Pacific and Google International as the corporate owners of the Chrome Operating System (OS), Google Cloud, and Chrome Device Management, which formed part of the ministry’s education digitalisation policy. Purwanto also noted that Nadiem held an online meeting with Google representative Caesar Sengupta in April 2020 to discuss Chromebooks. During the trial, Nadiem explained that Caesar was a senior Google executive previously tasked with marketing Chromebooks in the Asia Pacific region, including Indonesia. The judge added that in 2021, Caesar Sengupta became a Commissioner of PT Gojek Tokopedia. The panel of judges assessed that the series of meetings demonstrated a substantial strategic relationship between Nadiem and Google that went beyond the ordinary relationship between a public official and a technology company. Based on testimony from RA Kusuma Hadiani, Director of Legal and Corporate Secretary of PT GoTo Gojek Tokopedia Tbk, Google’s total investment in PT AKAB from 2017 to 2021 reached 786.99 million US dollars. The panel noted that most of this investment occurred after Nadiem became minister, specifically in March 2020, May 2021, 22 September 2021, and 5 October 2021. The judge stated that the correlation between the timing of these Google investments, Nadiem’s term of office, and the series of Chromebook procurement policies indicated a connection that could not be considered coincidental. In this case, Nadiem Makarim was sentenced to 10 years in prison after being found guilty of committing corruption in the education digitalisation programme through the procurement of Chromebook laptops and Chrome Device Management at Kemendikbudristek. The panel of judges declared that the replacement money was related to the receipt of funds amounting to Rp809.59 billion originating from PT AKAB through PT Gojek Indonesia. The majority of PT AKAB’s funds were said to have come from Google’s investment of 786.99 million US dollars. In its verdict, the panel of judges stated that Nadiem had abused his authority, resulting in state financial losses of Rp1.56 trillion. The panel also stated that the act was committed together with three other defendants who had been sentenced in separate cases, namely Ibrahim Arief alias Ibam, Mulyatsyah, and Sri Wahyuningsih, as well as Jurist Tan, who remains a fugitive.