In the bustling port city of Bandar Lampung, Sumatra, on 26 August 1962, a girl was born into a family of university lecturers who believed books were more important than television. Sri Mulyani Indrawati grew up reading economics textbooks for fun. Today, at 63, she is:
- The longest-serving Finance Minister in Indonesia’s democratic history (2005–2010 and 2016–present)
- The first woman to hold the post
- Ranked by Forbes as the world’s 2nd most powerful woman in 2023 and 2024 (behind only Ursula von der Leyen)
- The architect who pulled Indonesia — the world’s fourth-most-populous nation — through the 2008 global financial crisis, the 2020 COVID crash, and the 2022–2023 inflation storm without a single IMF bailout
She has done it all while remaining famously incorruptible in a country where corruption once cost the state $30 billion a year.
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From Lampung Classroom to Washington and Back
Sri Mulyani earned her economics degree from Universitas Indonesia in 1986, then a master’s and PhD from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign on a USAID scholarship. She returned to teach at her alma mater and became one of Indonesia’s sharpest voices on fiscal policy.
In 2005, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono shocked the nation by appointing the 43-year-old academic as Finance Minister — the youngest person and first woman ever in the role. She immediately fired 1,500 corrupt tax and customs officials, introduced electronic tax filing, and raised Indonesia’s sovereign credit rating for the first time in a decade.
When the 2008 crisis hit, she refused World Bank and IMF loans, instead using $6 billion in domestic reserves to stabilise the rupiah and keep growth above 6 %. Global markets called it “the Indonesian miracle.”
In 2010, frustrated by political sabotage of her anti-corruption drive, she resigned and became Managing Director of the World Bank Group — the first person from a developing country to hold the number-three position. There she managed a $100 billion portfolio and pushed for green financing long before it was fashionable.
The Homecoming: 2016–Present
In 2016, President Joko Widodo begged her to return as Finance Minister. She accepted on one condition: full authority over tax and customs. Since then she has:
- Raised Indonesia’s tax-to-GDP ratio from 10.4 % to 12.8 % — the biggest jump in ASEAN history — by cracking down on tax evasion among the ultra-rich
- Created the sovereign wealth fund Indonesia Investment Authority (2021) now managing $35 billion
- Led the country to its first-ever investment-grade rating upgrade from all three major agencies simultaneously (2023)
- Kept inflation below 3 % in 2024–2025 despite global food and energy shocks
- Launched the world’s largest carbon-tax scheme for coal plants (2022) while simultaneously pushing a $20 billion Just Energy Transition Partnership with G7 nations
During COVID-19 she designed a $50 billion stimulus package that kept unemployment under 6 % and poverty from spiking. When the nickel export ban (2020) caused a WTO dispute, she stared down Europe and won downstream investment worth $30 billion instead.
The Woman Behind the Numbers
Married to economist Tony Sumartono since 1987, she is mother to three children and still rides her motorcycle to the office when traffic is bad. She runs marathons, prays five times a day, and has never been implicated in a single corruption scandal — a rarity in Indonesian politics.
When critics call her “too tough,” she smiles and says in perfect English: “I am not tough. I am just doing my job.”
In 2025, with Indonesia on track to become the world’s 4th-largest economy by 2045, Sri Mulyani remains at her desk until midnight most nights, red pen in hand, still fighting for every rupiah to reach classrooms, clinics and villages instead of private pockets.
She never wanted to be a symbol. She just wanted Indonesia to work. And because of her, it increasingly does.
