By Yaluritja (Clarrie Isaacs)
The invasion and occupation of our ancestral lands by the British 209 years ago was an act of terrorism. The confiscation of our lands and their possession by the present neo-colonial white Australian government is not only immoral but illegal under international law.
The systematic violation of the human rights of Australia's indigenous peoples by the British invaders and the present neo-colonial regimes has yet to be addressed.
Indigenous people in Australia have endured mass extermination; forced removal from our ancestral lands to locations where we were made wards of the state and interned in slave camps; rape, separation from our children and involuntary medical sterilisation; and we have been deprived of a quality of life based on our own spirituality.
Indigenous people have been forced to endure Fourth World living conditions to such an extent that World Vision has now set up in Western Australia to address the urgent needs.
Each and every aspect of the lives of our people is still legislatively controlled by an alien system that excludes our self-determining participation.
For 209 years all-white judges have presided, without shame or guilt, over courts which dispense harsh and extreme penalties against youth and ordinary people, but fail to act in a proper manner when dealing with the white-collar and corporate crimes of this society's elite.
The police forces still act as terrorists and political soldiers for the governments of Australia. In Western Australia, they have been given new powers to arrest people and intern them in mental asylums — the same system used by the Nazis to discredit anyone who didn't accept their system of government.
The former federal Aboriginal affairs minister, Labor's Robert Tickner, contributed to a catastrophic decline in Aboriginal health. Now the current federal Aboriginal affairs minister, John Herron, is promoting "back to the '50s and assimilation" and has totally failed to understand and address the most fundamental needs of indigenous people.
Indoctrination and assimilation of the hearts and minds of Australia's indigenous people by the white Australian government is necessary if they are to maintain the status quo, including the belief that all people in this country live in a free and just society — provided they are prepared to accept that human rights violations against Australia's indigenous peoples are "an innocent breach of the law" and that human rights in Australia can be forfeited "in the national interest"!
The stranglehold of colonisation on our people and our country has been dispelled by Mabo, but we have been cruelly fed the illusions of native title and traditional use legislation. In the process, the stranglehold has actually been reinforced and the naive idea introduced that so-called stakeholders in Australia have equal status of ownership to our ancestral lands.
Rather than coming to terms with the undeniable right of Australia's indigenous peoples to inherit the property of their ancestors, the white government created its own Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission and the Department of Indigenous Affairs to prevent any real indigenous empowerment, sovereignty and self-determination. These quasi-government departments are structured around tight government controls to ensure that major issues are ultimately decided according to ministerial discretion.
The Native Title Tribunal hearings are as much a fraud as wreckonciliation. This ad hoc process of returning land to the indigenous people of Australia lacks international recognition, consistency and genuine commitment.
The re-emergence of explicit racism in this country has propelled Australia into the spotlight of world attention. The Racism No! campaign in the 1996 WA state election was more than just an election statement. Racism No! is an ongoing campaign and all people are asked to join in.
Democracy does not exist in a society which does not uphold minority rights. Don't share in the so-called glory of the past on "Australia Day". Take a stand, confront the atrocities of this unjust system and act to stop it from continuing:
- Write, fax or telephone a message of protest to John Howard and other world leaders.
- Contact local MPs and ask them what they are going to do on January 26.
- Ring talkback radio shows and present your point of view.
- Ask the management of TV stations in your area to present Aboriginal points of view on January 26 with equal balance.
- Contact your local newspaper and community groups about the injustice of celebrating and calling it Australia Day, and ask about alternative activities.
- Fly the Aboriginal flag at half-mast and explain the impact and injustice of invasion to others.
- Distribute copies of this statement to your friends or refer them to http://www.iinet.net.au/~mktrecon/invasion.html on the world wide web.
- Join in the resistance activities on January 26 and in the ongoing struggle to bring about positive change for indigenous people.