Three Defendants in the Chromebook Corruption Trial Held Today

JAKARTA - A total of three defendants in the alleged corruption case in the procurement of Chromebooks are scheduled to face a trial at the Corruption Court (Tipikor) at the Central Jakarta District Court, Thursday, April 16.

Quoted by Antara, the three defendants are the Technology Consultant of the Ministry of Education and Culture, Ibrahim Arief alias Ibam, the Director of Elementary Schools at the Directorate General of PAUD Dikdasmen of the Ministry of Education and Culture for the period 2020-2021, Sri Wahyuningsih, and the Director of the First Middle School at the Directorate General of PAUD Dikdasmen for the period 2020-2021, Mulyatsyah.

The trial will be chaired by presiding judge Purwanto Abdullah and is scheduled to take place at 10.00 WIB in the Muhammad Hatta Ali courtroom.

In this case, the three defendants are charged with committing corruption in the education digitization program in the form of the procurement of Chromebook laptops and Chrome Device Management (CDM) in the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology in 2019-2022.

The act is suspected of causing state losses of up to Rp2.18 trillion, consisting of Rp1.56 trillion from the education digitization program and 44.05 million US dollars or the equivalent of Rp621.39 billion from the procurement of CDM which is considered unnecessary.

In the indictment, it is stated that the defendants allegedly committed this act together with a number of other parties, including the Minister of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology for the period 2019-2024 Nadiem Anwar Makarim and former staff, especially Jurist Tan.

The illegal acts include procurement of learning facilities based on information and communication technology in the form of Chromebooks and CDM in the 2020 to 2022 budget years which are not in accordance with planning and procurement principles.

In addition, the preparation of a study on the needs of information technology devices is allegedly directed at the use of Chromebooks with the Chrome OS operating system and CDM without being based on the real needs of education, especially in the lagging, leading, and outermost areas (3T).

The defendants are also suspected of setting unit prices and allocating budgets without being supported by survey data that can be accounted for, as well as carrying out procurement through e-Catalog and School Procurement Information System (SIPLah) without adequate price evaluation.

For their actions, the three defendants were charged with violating Article 2 paragraph (1) or Article 3 in conjunction with Article 18 of Law Number 31 of 1999 concerning the Eradication of Corruption as amended by Law Number 20 of 2001 jo Article 55 paragraph (1) -1 of the Criminal Code.