THE January 15, 1974, incident was the milestone that accelerated the centralization of Suharto's power. Immediately after the destruction and burnings that killed several people, the New Order regime clamped down on people viewed as the opposition.

When the students took to the streets that day-the day Japanese Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka came to town-they shouted their opposition to the presence of foreign capital. But together with other grou