When Nadiem Makarim joined Indonesia’s government in 2019 as minister for education and culture, the then 35-year-founder of Gojek(印尼网约车与生活服务平台), a ride-hailing app and Indonesia’s first unicorn(独角兽公司), promised to move fast and break things(快速行动，打破常规). It has not ended well. On June 30th an Indonesian court sentenced Mr Nadiem to ten years in prison on corruption charges (he had pleaded not guilty). He must also pay 810bn rupiah ($45m) in restitution(赔偿金), or face more five years. Speaking outside the courtroom, Mr Nadiem said he did not have the sum, “and [the judges] know it(法官们知道这一点)”.
当纳迪姆·马卡里姆于2019年加入印尼政府担任教育与文化部长时，这位当时35岁的Gojek（一家网约车应用、印尼第一家独角兽公司）创始人承诺要快速行动、打破常规。结局并不好。6月30日，印尼法院以腐败罪判处纳迪姆十年监禁（他不认罪）。他还必须支付8100亿印尼盾（4500万美元）的赔偿金，否则将再面临五年刑期。在法庭外，纳迪姆表示他没有这笔钱，“法官们也知道这一点”。
In government, Mr Nadiem—a graduate of Harvard University and ex-McKinsey consultant—led a pandemic-era push(疫情时期的推动) to digitise(数字化) schools, focusing on poor, rural areas, to improve patchy(不均衡的) textbook distribution. For this the education ministry bought some 3trn rupiah of Chromebooks(Chromebook笔记本电脑), cheap laptops using Google software.
在政府任职期间，纳迪姆先生——毕业于哈佛大学，曾是麦肯锡顾问——领导了一场疫情期间的学校数字化运动，重点关注贫困农村地区，以改善教材分发不均的问题。为此，教育部购买了价值约3万亿印尼盾的Chromebook，这些是使用谷歌软件的廉价笔记本电脑。
It would prove to be his downfall. Prosecutors accused him of a quid pro quo(利益交换) with the search giant. Influenced by Google(谷歌公司)’s investments in Gojek, the court found that Mr Nadiem pushed his ministry to buy Chromebooks at inflated prices(虚高价格), resulting in 2.1trn rupiah in state losses, nearly half of which prosecutors accused him of siphoning off(中饱私囊). The fact that the laptops need steady internet connections, a rarity in rural Indonesia, showed Mr Nadiem’s ulterior motives(不可告人的动机), they argued. He tried to make “Google the sole controller of the education ecosystem in Indonesia,” prosecutors said. (Google denies any such scheme.)
这最终成了他的败笔。检方指控他与这家搜索巨头存在利益交换。受谷歌投资Gojek的影响，法院认定纳迪姆推动其部门以虚高价格购买Chromebook，导致国家损失2.1万亿印尼盾，其中近一半被检方指控他中饱私囊。笔记本电脑需要稳定的互联网连接（这在印尼农村很罕见），他们认为这暴露了纳迪姆的不可告人动机。检方称，他试图让“谷歌成为印尼教育生态系统的唯一控制者”。（谷歌否认有任何此类阴谋。）