[The following is a report posted by Joyo Indonesia News by a noted political analyst, who prefers to remain anonymous.]

It was the last day of campaigning and Golkar got the last word. Only trouble is, virtually no one was listening. We started out at the Hotel Indonesia Roundabout. The day before it had been choked with people. From atop the Mandarin, the scene below looked like millions of red blood cells surging through the city's main artery – except in very slow motion. Today it was all gone. In the afterglow this morning emerged a tiny knot of Golkar supporters who by mid morning had established a beach head on the pool's edge, right in front of the big video screen. It was a surly looking pack of Pemuda Pancasila. The traffic moved easily. No one really bothered to look. The previous evening's news reported how Golkar had gone to police headquarters insisting on stepped up protection for their day of campaigning.

We wanted to catch one of Akbar Tanjung's last campaign appearances, but since the rallies would not get underway until after Friday prayers, we figured we'd swing around town a bit looking for signs of Golkar life.

There was the occasional banner, the occasional flag. But virtually no convoys. Eventually we headed toward North Jakarta, to the Lapangan Sunter Agung where the first major rally of the afternoon was to be staged. It was hard to find. The taxi driver had to stop and keep asking people where it was. There was no thickening of traffic near the site, no flags or banners. You couldn't tell you were nearing it, even from a few hundred meters away.

To pass the time the taxi driver kept cracking anti-Golkar jokes. He asked us if either of us would be willing to run down the middle of the street waving a Golkar flag for Rp. 10,000. When we declined he upped it to Rp. 100,000 and laughed. "Who wants to get pelted with trash for Rp. 100,000?" he asks.

We arrived a little after 1 pm. Almost no one had arrived, and Akbar Tanjung would be there in an hour. I thought there was a serious chance the rally would be cancelled. There were a couple dozen kids (really small kids) hanging around with Golkar flags draped over their shoulders like Superman. >From the stage a Golkar woman was tossing candy from a box to the kids to get them whipped up. It worked for about five minutes. Then people went back to milling around.

I approached one woman standing off to the side and asked her if she was a Golkar supporter. "I used to be with a Pakistani family, but now I'm with a Golkar family," she said. An odd answer until you realize she was a maid and she was there, with a group of about 30 domestics who appear to have been brought along by the wealthy cadres on the stage. Padding the audience with one's servants is quite an innovation.

Up on the stage sat a couple pretty dangdut singers waiting for their turn to get people dancing. Right in front sat a classic Golkar lady. Her fingers dripped god jewelry, her tinted hair was pouffed up, and she was wearing these huge Jackie-O sunglasses, which might have made her look sleek and sophisticated were there not these gaudy gold medallions on the sides of the sunglass rims the size of bottle caps. She just sat there and seemed to brood from behind her shades.

Even fifteen minutes before Akbar Tanjung's entourage arrived, the scene on the stage was still remarkably morose. The crowd, now numbering several hundred, was pathetic. There was no energy.

"It's a small number, huh?" a younger Golkar woman on the stage said with an uneasy laugh.

The reception the opposition parties (especially Megawati's) have been getting has emboldened them, given them confidence, and generated a new sense of empowerment. The hostile and weak reception for Golkar appears to have broken the spirit of many die-hard followers. The Golkar people did not strut. They looked weakened and apologetic. It seemed as if there was a whiff of foreboding was in the air at this Sunter rally.

There was a brief moment of excitement when one of the Golkar people on the stage tried yelling slogans and cheers for the crowd.

"Golkar PKI!!!!" he screamed [Golkar Communist Party!]. Or at least that's what it sounded like through the garbling sound system.

In fact, he had said "Golkar DKI." I thought I was the only one who thought he screamed the initials of the banned Communist Party, but the surprised look on faces in the crowd suggested I was not alone.

As Akbar Tanjung's cars and buses pulled up near the back of the field, I looked out at the messages on the Golkar banners.

"Golkar Menang Wong Cilik Senang" [Golkar wins and the little people are happy] "Golkar W.O.W. Keren" [Golkar WOW Cool] "Gunakan Suara Anda Dengan Baik Milih Golkar" [Use your vote wisely by choosing Golkar]

The music reached a fevered pitch as Akbar Tanjung's group made its way through the crowd toward the podium. The stage was overflowing with reporters and the floorboards felt wobbly (several stages had collapsed for campaigners, including Tanjung).

Tanjung sat down and a tight gaggle of reporters formed an arc in front of him blocking the crowd's view of the main speaker for several long minutes. The music kept playing as a reporter thrust a handphone into Tanjung's face for a live radio interview right there on the stage in mid rally. Tanjung could not possibly hear a question being put to him either on the phone nor from the reporter holding the phone to the party leader's head. But Tanjung held forth to the radio audience anyway, ignoring the sea of about 2,000 supporters right in front of him behind the pack of reporters.

There was no string of warm up speeches. Tanjung simply got introduced and then he made his way to the microphones. He launched an almost robotic speech whose rhythm was kept by Tanjung's right hand waving overhead like a metronome during the entire 15 minute address. He bellowed into the microphone held in his left hand.

The youths gathered immediately below the stage kept jostling and jumping around through the entire speech.

These are highlights from Akbar Tanjung's extemporaneous speech:

"We are a religious party. We struggle for the whole country, the whole people. We are open to all races, groups, we take them all under our tent. We work for the prosperity of the people, for their enlightenment. We are dedicated to the people, from the lowest people all the way to the top. We struggle for the young and the old. For women, students, teachers."

"Golkar is dedicated to building Indonesia's human capital. Only with this can we prosper, move forward, and compete with other nations. We are reformers. This is the New Golkar. We don't want the status quo. Do you want the status quo? [The crowd yells back "No!"].

Islam figured prominently in the speech. In one segment that built on the party's official number on the ballot, 33, Tanjung said: "Say your prayers 33 times, say Allah is great 33 times, and read the sacred texts (wirid)in groups together 33 times. Golkar is blessed by the Almighty Allah."

Then Tanjung turned the microphone over to his beloved wife (his second of three wives, someone told me, though I do not know this for a fact). She gave a speech as well and then, in an Imelda moment, sang to the crowd. Akbar himself had struck a defensive note for Golkar, but his wife took it much further.

"Although we are criticized, insulted, and people say every conceivable terrible thing about us, it makes us strong. We grow stronger. Are we strong? [The crowd yells "Yes!"]. We are open to criticism, open to change."

Some local reporter sitting next to me leaned forward at that moment and said, "They were forced to be open to criticism and change. It's a bit much for them to take credit for this New Golkar."

Just after Tanjung left a heavy rain started and all the afternoon's rally appearances would have to be cancelled. While Tanjung was speaking to the people in North Jakarta, Golkar supporters were once again under attack elsewhere in the city – in the Senen area, where soldiers fired shots in the air to disperse an anti-Golkar crowd that kept up the siege for 5 hours, and on Sudirman where Golkar supporters were also harassed.

Golkar has a lot of money but is fragmented badly. They have everything to lose in the election, and yet they and their past remain their own worst enemy. Golkar is discredited and it is readily apparent the Indonesian people seriously desire to move on. The potential for election fraud makes predicting official elections results exceedingly difficult. But assuming the count really reflects the vote, I believe Golkar will get a very small percentage of the whole vote – perhaps as much as ten percent (though maybe 15 percent if there is significant cheating).

Analysts are correct to argue that Golkar has more influence in the outer provinces. But it is very difficult to transform that support into an electoral success, and certainly not one that would be workable (meaning it could govern).