Olympic triumph ends with political performance

By PETER CALDER and EUGENE BINGHAM

The irony was pointed but it was never going to dampen the party.

At the southern end of Stadium Australia, veteran rocker Peter Garrett - bearing an uncanny resemblance to the shaven-headed Australian swimmer Michael Klim - led his band Midnight Oil in a rousing rendition of their signature song Beds Are Burning.

"How can we dance," he sang, "when our Earth is turning? How can we sleep while our beds are burning?"

His shirt - like those of the rest of the band - was embossed with the single word Australian Prime Minister John Howard has steadfastly refused to say: "Sorry."

Scarcely had the echo of the last chord faded than the Aboriginal ensemble Yothu Yindi launched into its anthem Treaty ("All you talking politicians, words are easy, words are cheap").

The packed stadium sang along, waving the cheap plastic torches that had been placed in the polystyrene Eskies (chillybins) on every seat or waving the Eskies themselves. The point may not have eluded them but it was brushed aside in the fury of celebration.

For this was Sydney's night to party. With the blessing of IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch, who had earlier proclaimed that "you have presented to the world the best Olympic Games ever," Sydney was ready to pat itself on the back for a job extraordinarily well done.

For a fortnight - for months, for years - the city had wrestled with the logistical challenge of staging the greatest show on Earth. Last night, it was time to cut loose and the city did it in style.

The athletes were not forgotten: flag bearers for each nation entered the arena, joined later by team-mates in riotous profusion.

It followed a tradition suggested 44 years ago at the Melbourne Games by a 17-year-old Chinese-Australian boy, John Ian Wing.

An entry en masse, he wrote, would "make the games even greater [because] there would be only one nation. War, nationality and politics would be forgotten."

He has had his wish at every closing ceremony since and last night he was at Stadium Australia to see it.

And there was more than a measure of solemn ceremony as the Games drew to a close. Greek priestesses danced to music by Vangelis and angelic choirs filled the air to herald the handing over of the Olympic flag from Sydney to Athens, the venue for the next Games in 2004.

But much of the night belonged to the country's performers, who provided the soundtrack to the start of a party which, doubtless, is still raging across most of Sydney.

Savage Garden, Jimmy Barnes and Kylie Minogue among others provided the soundtrack, and a parade of floats which saluted Aussie icons followed the track along which the last marathoner had run less than three hours earlier.

Just before the fireworks and fun began, the last competitor in the 2000 Olympics shared his loneliest moment with 110,000 people.

Elias Rodriquez of Micronesia stumbled into the stadium one hour after the winner, Gezahgne Abera of Ethiopia. Rodriquez had done it hard, but he raised his hands to acknowledge the crowd.

For 15 days, speedsters held the attention of the world.

But the last day belonged to the endurance athletes, the men of the marathon.

It was somehow appropriate. No other event has created as much legend as the 42km grind that always caps off the Olympics.

In the stadium last night was the man whose tired utterance after the 1968 marathon at the Mexico Games endures as one of the defining quotes of the Olympics.

Like Rodriquez, John Akhwari of Tanzania was the last man to enter the stadium. One leg bloodied and bandaged, he had struggled to make it to the line, where he received a standing ovation.

Asked why he had done it, he replied: "My country did not send me 7000 miles away to start the race. They sent me 7000 miles to finish it."

Then at last the evergreen Slim Dusty led the throng in a rousing version of Waltzing Matilda. That was the signal for the flame to pick its way in sparkling fits and starts down the Parramatta River to the Harbour Bridge, lighting up the old coathanger in what was trumpeted as the biggest display of pyrotechnics in history.

The cauldron above Olympic Park is cold now and that flame will probably not burn in southern skies again for another half-century. But it has burned brightly here, and Sydney has good cause to feel proud.