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yam, the newspaper boy in our neighborhood, was approaching on his bike as I stepped out of my front gate the other day. Smiling as usual, he handed me my subscription copy and said, "The chief crocodile wants to be a gecko!"

"Oh, that's new," I replied, pretending I didn't know what he was talking about.

No, this was not a bedtime story. We were talking about the ongoing great battle between our heroes, the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) and the National Police.

As you know, "Gecko vs Crocodile" has become the offi cial battle cry in a public anti-corruption campaign that is receiving huge popular support.

Syam was apparently amused by Koran Tempo's front-page caricature depicting a fat fiery crocodile transforming itself into a cute, wideeyed gecko in the midst of confused lizards assembled on the doorstep of their abode called the KPK.

Main stories of the day included National Police chief Gen. Bambang Hendarso Danuri apologizing to the public for a slur made by one of his most senior aides to express his low opinion of the KPK, likening the commission to an overconfi dent "gecko" challenging a "crocodile" (the National Police).

"In fact, I am part of the gecko *community*, too" Bambang said during a meeting with media leaders in Jakarta on Monday. Under public pressure to resign, Bambang swore that his staff offi cer had acted in his personal capacity and did not represent the views of the National Police.

The creative officer who came up with the "Gecko vs Crocodile" analogy and set the world on fi re is Snr. Comr Susno Duadji, the National Police chief of criminal investigations - and he did so during an interview with Tempo magazine in April. He was reportedly offered Rp 10 billion as a gratuity from a heavyweight depositor with (the ailing) Bank Century for helping the businessman transfer his legally disputable US$18 million from Surabaya to Jakarta.

Susno was infuriated to learn that the KPK, investigating the bank's Rp 6.7 trillion bailout scandal, had wiretapped his phone conversation with the businessman's lawyer at the time when he made the deal. He has fi ercely denied the allegations. However, under intense popular pressure he resigned on Thursday to face an independent inquiry.

Not losing his sense of humor, Susno quipped during an emotional hearing with sympathetic legislators on Friday, "In fi ve years from now, I'm afraid somebody else will claim the rights *to the analogy* and I'll have to go to court to retain it."

On a different occasion, the goodspirited Attorney General Hendarman Supandji also boasted in September that if the police and the Attorney General's Offi ce teamed up to handle the Bank Century scandal, then the alliance would be like Godzilla.

But Hendarman is luckier than Susno, because antigraft activists have not started calling him and other attorneys "Godzilla". well, at least not yet.

In fact, Susno's pick of crocodile to describe police power only adds credence to the common perception of the institution: frightening. I don't know if I am alone, but I still get intimidated going to the police just to pay my vehicle tax or to extend my driver's license, with all those unsmiling offi cers and employees, scalpers and middlemen hounding me.

Traditionally, the crocodile is admired, or feared, for its brute strength, which enables it to wrestle with the much bigger buffalos that venture into its territory. Many political parties and units in the armed forces have mighty animals such as bulls, eagles and tigers in their logos - to tell us they have all that brute strength to get the job done so don't mess with them.

Susno's condescending description of the KPK as a "gecko" seems to have backfi red like a misguided missile, invoking popular sympathy so massive and widespread that some predict it could develop into a people-power movement threatening the Yudhoyono administration if not managed properly.

"I am a gecko and am not afraid to fi ght a crocodile," scream KPK supporters.

The geckos are using tactics, rather than force, to mobilize support from fellow lizards, believing that the crocodile can only be overpowered if geckos unite. And a growing number of "geckos" have been resorting to Facebook, tweeting and creeping in the streets to force the crocodile and its conspirators to reform.

Do not underestimate these particular geckos. Since the war broke out, they have already brought down a "crocodile" and a "Godzilla".

Viva the Geckos!