For 30 years they ruled mightily with electoral impunity, ending the game before it had even begun.
But as the Golkar Party celebrated its 44th anniversary on Monday, hot on the heels of a three-day national party meeting, the once dominant force of the New Order was putting on a brave face ahead of the 2009 general elections.
No longer is the sea of yellow -- the party's color -- the political tidal wave it once was.
Golkar's heydey of the late 1980s through to the mid-1990s, when they commanded more than 70 percent of the vote, is but a memory.
Nevertheless, the Golkar Party, along with the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), retains its position at the forefront of Indonesian politics.
In the last two elections, Golkar retained about one-fifth of the popular vote.
In many ways, the party is still the big brother of Indonesian politics.
Established in 1964 as a Joint Secretariat of Functional Groups, Golkar was the amalgamation of several dozen political organizations. In the late 1960s, under the supervision of Ali Murtopo, it emerged as President Soeharto's primary political vehicle.
Like the Communist Party in China, Golkar then emerged as the supreme political authority in Indonesia by monopolizing power through control of all state apparatus and the legislative process.
To the chagrin of anti-New Order parties, and surprise of many pundits, it has survived, even thrived, in the post-Soeharto era by avoiding an electoral backlash that could have spelled the end of Golkar preponderance.
Some have said that Golkar possesses an unfair advantage over newer parties.
That may be true, but even the Golkar leadership has succeeded in transforming itself to better suit a different era, creating a new generation of leadership more akin to the present demands of a new Indonesian state.
It also blazed a trail in opening up the once exclusive dominance of Jakarta politics by engaging in a party convention ahead of the 2004 presidential election, which exposed the party to various alternative options it would not have once considered.
In many ways Golkar represents all that is good and bad in Indonesia.
Its pluralist-nationalist platform underlines the essence of an Indonesian nationhood.
While it may have sponsored parochial and sinister issues, such as the implementation of sharia law, in certain local elections, on the national scene Golkar remains committed to the nonreligious pluralist agenda.
Yet the predominance of big business and menacing power politics is a facet distressing to many who would otherwise feel akin to Golkar's ideological confines.
Instead of opening up the party further to public influence and regional-provincial persuasion, the Golkar elite has instead chosen to revert to the control tactics of the central board.
It is a disappointing development that is not becoming for Indonesia's largest political party. We had hoped that Golkar, as big brother, would introduce innovation and accommodate the grassroots by institutionalizing a bottom-up process.
Regional chapters and Golkar members should be avenues to promote political aspirations and political education. Instead, they are no more than pawns in the great game played by the Jakarta-based power brokers.
This year has been an amazingly educational year for all as we witness the intense struggle in American politics.
But Golkar has failed to learn the lessons of this process: No matter how important and considerable the Republican or Democratic Party has become, each is still beholden to engagement with, in the words of John McCain and Barack Obama, "Joe the plumber" (the average voter).
These parties may structure the processes, but the impetus, the engine of enthusiasm, is still with the electorate.
If Golkar retains its arrogant ways and refuses to connect with the Indonesian version of Joe, then its perceived electoral slide will be a reality.
We urge Golkar to take the initiative to educate the electorate about the processes of politics by opening up the party to the influence of things other than money and power.
Don't let this initiative be grasped by smaller parties.
As it is, Indonesia's oldest and biggest party is acting like a desperate minor newcomer on the political stage.
