Anita Rachman – Some observers say today's anti-government rallies are not as big as last month's World Anticorruption Day demonstrations. But they disagree on the reasons why.

The Deputy chief of the Central Jakarta Police, Firli, theorized that the organizations involved didn't have enough money to assemble the predicted crowd of 40,000. "40,000 people they said? How can they manage to get them and pay all those people? It's all about money," he said.

But Abidin, an activist from the Front for the People's Struggle, denied the protesters were only motivated by handouts. "Maybe there are some paid demonstrators, but we all here in the front are here purely pushed by our own will to speak our demands," he said. "Do the police want to bet?"

Abidin in turn blamed the police, saying they were preventing many of his group's members from reaching the demonstrations. "Many of our labor friends from Bogor have detained, stopped by the police," he said. "They don't want us to get here to Jakarta to join the rally."