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INDONESIA-JUSTICE
Indonesian woman gets jail after exposing philandering boss
LOMBOK, Indonesia, Nov 16, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – An Indonesian woman who exposed
her cheating boss has been slapped with a six-month jail term for her
trouble.
The supreme court’s shock ruling overturned an earlier court decision that
had cleared the woman, Baiq Nuril Maknun, of breaking a controversial law
against spreading indecent material.
“I’m saddened and shocked by this sentence,” Maknun’s husband Lalu Muhamad
Isnaini said Friday in reaction to the ruling, which was issued last week.
The odd case stretches back to 2012 when Maknun recorded a conversation in
which the principal of the school where she worked on the island of Lombok
revealed graphic sexual details about an affair he was having with another
colleague.
Co-workers of the school administrator — who herself had rebuffed the
principal’s repeated advances — later convinced Maknun to release the
recording in a bid to expose the man’s history of lecherous behaviour,
according to her lawyer Joko Jumadi.
“The principal shared very graphic details about his affair with the
school’s treasurer in the recording,” he told AFP.
In response, the principal fired Maknun and filed a complaint with
authorities.
Maknun was initially cleared of the charges by a local court in Lombok,
next to holiday hotspot Bali.
But, last Friday, Indonesia’s top court reversed that decision, finding
her guilty of violating the electronic information law and sentencing her to
six months’ jail along with a 500 million rupiah ($34,000) fine.
The 36-year-old Maknun told local reporters that the ruling was unfair.
“I’m just a victim — what did I do wrong?” she said at the time.
The court did not give reasons for its verdict.
The prosecutor’s office in Lombok told AFP on Friday it is reviewing the
case before Maknun begins her sentence.
Indonesia’s corruption-riddled justice system has long been criticised for
the quality of its rulings, while the electronic information law itself has
come under fire for being too vague and open to misuse.
BSS/AFP/MR/ 1500 hrs