Bahlil Lahadalia

Bahlil Lahadalia (born 1976) is an Indonesian businessman and politician of humble origins who became Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources in 2024 and general chairman of the Golkar Party, after leading the Investment Coordinating Board and serving as Indonesia's first Minister of Investment; in October 2026 he was additionally made Coordinating Minister for Downstreaming and Energy Transition ^{1 2}.

Lahadalia was born in Banda, Central Maluku, on 7 August 1976, the second of nine children; his father worked as a construction labourer and his mother washed other people's clothes and sold homemade cakes ^{1 3}. The family came originally from Southeast Sulawesi and moved in 1988 to Fakfak in West Papua after a volcanic eruption near Banda ¹. As a schoolboy he sold cakes and ice at school, worked as a conductor on the public minibus route between Fakfak town and the airport, and later drove one himself ^{1 4}. He studied economics at STIE Port Numbay in Jayapura, graduating at 26 after his studies were interrupted by the unrest of May 1998, and was active in the Muslim Students' Association (HMI), rising from its Papua regional leadership to general treasurer of its national leadership in 2001 to 2003 ^{1 4}. He later took a master's degree at Cenderawasih University, and in October 2024 the University of Indonesia awarded him a doctorate completed in twenty months, which the English article calls the fastest doctorate the school had granted and the subject of national controversy and an ethics enquiry, while the Indonesian article reports that the university suspended the degree ^{1 4}. He is married to Sri Suparni and has three sons ^{1 5}.

Lahadalia worked for the state surveying firm Sucofindo before founding his own companies in Papua — PT Rifa Capital, PT Bersama Papua Unggul and PT Dwijati Sukses, active in trade, plantations, fisheries, transport and mining — and he chaired the Indonesian Young Entrepreneurs Association (HIPMI) from 2015 to 2019 ¹. In the 2019 presidential election he directed Joko Widodo's campaign outreach to young voters, and on 23 October 2019 Widodo appointed him head of the Investment Coordinating Board (BKPM) ^{1 2}. When the Investment Ministry was created he became its first minister on 28 April 2021, and in August 2024 he moved to Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources, a portfolio he also briefly held ad interim in February 2022 ^{1 5}. As investment minister he revoked more than two thousand mining business licences he said were idle or misused, a policy Tempo magazine reported was applied selectively and for the benefit of some businessmen ¹. On 21 August 2024 he was elected general chairman of Golkar, Indonesia's second-largest party ¹. In February 2025 his policy restricting subsidised liquefied petroleum gas to registered distributors caused long queues and public anger; President Prabowo Subianto reversed it within days and Lahadalia apologised ^{1 4}. He received the Bintang Mahaputera Adipradana on 14 August 2024 ^{1 5}. In a cabinet reshuffle on 1 October 2026 President Prabowo inaugurated him as Coordinating Minister for Downstreaming and Energy Transition, a post he holds concurrently with the energy and mineral resources ministry ². No text read for this record names a school of Islam for Lahadalia himself — Wikidata carries only a generic Islam statement, and the texts document his HMI student activism, an affiliation — so his faith is recorded as unknown ^{1 4 3}.

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