By Melissa Corbett
and Justine Kamprad
MELBOURNE — More than 350 people marked "Invasion Day" here on January 26 with a rally in the Bourke Street Mall. It was one of several events held around the country on the day.
Rally chairperson Charmaine Clarke declared that Australia had no right to celebrate Australia Day. Well-known Aboriginal activist Gary Foley said that Aboriginal people must have control of Aboriginal land before reconciliation can be realised. Foley added that white and black people have a common enemy and that the Aboriginal movement should not be seen as being represented only by the heads of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Commission.
Other speakers included David Glanz from Trade Unionists for Land Rights and Pam Gianacopolis, who raised the issue of racism against migrants. Glen, a Geelong activist, called on indigenous leaders to use the Sydney Olympics as a forum to popularise Aboriginal issues locally and internationally.
The rally marched down Swanson Street and "invaded" the official Australia Day festival. Members of the local Aboriginal community burned an Australian Flag. Street theatre was performed by Melbourne Workers' Theatre which made fun of Australian nationalism and showed how big business benefits from denying Aboriginal people's land rights.
In Adelaide, reports Bronwen Beechey, an Invasion Day concert at the Tandanya cultural centre was attended by more than 100 people. Speakers said justice and land rights must be granted before genuine reconciliation can take place.
Adnyamathanha elder and land council chairperson Gordon Coulthard criticised the concert, telling ABC radio that the term "Invasion Day" was divisive and hindered to reconciliation.
In the evening, 100 people took part in a candlelight vigil and march organised by Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation to demand that the Kumarangk (Hindmarsh Island) bridge be stopped and that the Arabunna people be allowed to return to their traditional land at Lake Eyre, which has been occupied by Western Mining Corporation.
The vigil gathered at the site of the protest camp set up by the Arabunna people in December. The camp was forcibly closed down by the state government and Adelaide City Council. The protesters then marched around Government House.
Arabunna representatives and their supporters re-established the protest camp at Peace Park in North Adelaide on January 24, following a decision by Adelaide City Council to allow them to camp there during daylight hours until February 2.
From Canberra, Ruth Ratcliffe told Green Left Weekly that indigenous people and their supporters converged at the historic Aboriginal Tent Embassy in front of Old Parliament House to mark 212 years since the European invasion. Speakers noted that there was little to celebrate because indigenous people continue to face gross discrimination and suffer rates of ill health and incarceration many times higher than white Australians.
Mike Leach, a tribal elder from British Columbia, spoke about the similarities of indigenous struggles in Canada and Australia. The gathering was also addressed by Uncle Bill, Isobel Coe, Michael Anderson and Ray Swan.
In Wollongong, reports Andy Gianniotis, more than 50 people gathered to celebrate the survival of the Aboriginal people at an Invasion Day barbeque held on the banks of Lake Illawarra. Aunt Mary Davis, who was an original activist with the South Coast Aboriginal Advancement League, attended with other local Kooris and non-indigenous supporters of Aboriginal land rights.
Aunt Mary spoke of past struggles, including for the 1967 referendum that recognised Aboriginal people's citizenship rights. She criticised the lack of services for Aboriginal young people.
Activists from the Port Kembla Hospital picket line, the women's liberation movement, Wollongong University, and Resistance and the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP) also attended.
Dr Margaret Perrott from Illawarra Residents for Native Title and a member of the DSP stressed that the Aboriginal people's struggle for land rights has still a long way to go.