More than 200 people rallied to call for an end to the Northern Territory intervention at Sydney Town Hall on May 28. Monica Morgan, from Amnesty International, told the crowd the intervention was forcing Aboriginal people off their lands and taking away their culture.
Morgan said this was the outcome of an ongoing process of assimilation that began in Sydney in 1788 and spread across the country. She said ongoing solidarity was necessary for Aboriginal people to survive as a culture.
Construction Forestry Mining Energy Union organiser Rebel Hanlon pledged union support to the campaign, saying the CFMEU was "in it for the long haul".
Eva Cox from Women for Wik condemned the intervention's policy of "income management" and, in particular, Aboriginal affairs minister Jenny Macklin's suggestion that Aboriginal people wanted the policy.
"Pouring through the documents”, Cox said. "I can't find any evidence that anyone wanted this policy forced onto them."
The rally marched around the city block with lively chanting and drumming. It was organised by the Stop the Intervention Collective Sydney, which is building towards a protest on June 20, the three-year anniversary of the intervention being announced.
[For more information, visit stoptheintervention.org.]