Goodooga, northwest NSW, 3 January 2010 - - A NSW activist likens the struggle for Aboriginal rights to the uprisings to win freedom in China and Iran.
“The repressive and discriminatory laws that we are subject to here in Australia would not be tolerated anywhere else in the free world,” Michael Anderson writes in a media release (full text below).
Mr Anderson is the last survivor of the four young Black Power men who set up the Aboriginal embassy in Canberra in 1972. He leads the 3,000 Euahlayi of northwest NSW.
He is calling Elders from across the country to a summit in Canberra on 30 January and 1 February.
Citing a 1968 cabinet decision, he argues that all Australian governments continue to pursue assimilation of Aborigines and to ignore that they have and want to practise their own cultures.
“By continuing their assimilation policies, despite the success of the 1967 referendum,” Mr Anderson writes, “the Australian federal and state governments should realise that some of the people may be fooled sometimes but we will not all be fooled all the time.”
“It is important for our people to understand the deceit and deception that continue to be peddled by all political parties in Aboriginal affairs.”
Mr Anderson argues that all successive governments have kept a stranglehold on all that Aborigines have attempted to achieve through their grants and funding conditions when funding Aboriginal organisations.
“We have not been able to become self-determining and self sufficient. All programmes put in place to deliver services to our communities are socialist in their design and purpose, with the federal and state ministers for Aboriginal affairs being the gate keepers.
“Up front they put wall-to-wall semi-important black fullas only to
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demonstrate to the rest of the world that Australian governments are doing something about establishing an independent Aboriginal programme to bridge the gap between the two Australias.”
“De-colonisation has occurred in every previously colonised part of the developed world except Australia,” the Euahlayi Elder notes.
“Everywhere else people have fought for their right to retain their distinct identity, including their right to keep and speak their own languages, their culture and their own religious practices.”
“Nationalist movements all over the world have erupted because of the oppressive rules that governed people and their lives that are designed and maintained by the dominant society. China and Iran are just two examples of places whose people are trying to win their freedom. We are no different here in Australia.”
Mr Anderson is calling Elders from across the country to a summit in Canberra on 30 January and 1 February.
Michael Anderson can be contacted at 02 68296355 landline, 04272 92 492 mobile, 02 68296375 fax, ngurampaa@bigpond.com.au
Mr Anderson’s release in full:
By continuing their assimilation policies despite the success of the 1967 referendum, the Australian federal and state governments should realise that some of the people may be fooled sometimes but we will not all be fooled all the time.
It is important for our people to understand the deceit and deception that continue to be peddled by all political parties in Aboriginal affairs.
The following are passages of a federal cabinet’s decision (Decision No. 314) dated Sydney, 2 July, 1968.
1. The Cabinet referred firstly to the objective which its Aboriginal policy is to serve. It declared firmly that the ultimate objective would continue to be assimilation – a single Australian community.
2. While recognising that it will take generations for the Aboriginals to become fully assimilated into the Australian community, the Cabinet’s position is that it will hold patiently and purposefully to this aim. It will measure all any policy proposal against it and would want to avoid proposals which, by identifying Aboriginals as such and setting them permanently apart from other Australians, are likely to have the effect of acknowledging and establishing a policy of continuing separate development leading to an eventual racial problem.
3. Within the foregoing, the Cabinet indicated that it is ready to contemplate support for transitional arrangements which would help Aboriginals to overcome social and other handicaps which now impede or stand in the way of, more rapid progress towards assimilation.
This policy was signed off on by the secretary to the cabinet, Mr. E.J. Bunting.
What we must all remember is that all successive governments have maintained a very tight stranglehold on all that we have attempted to achieve and they have done this through their grants and funding conditions when they have agreed to fund our organisations.
We have not been able to become self-determining and self sufficient. All programmes put in place to deliver services to our communities are socialist in their design and purpose, with the federal and state ministers for Aboriginal affairs being the gate keepers. Up front they put wall-to-wall semi-important black fullas only to demonstrate to the rest of the world that Australian governments are doing something about establishing an independent Aboriginal programme to bridge the gap between the two Australias.
De-colonisation has occurred in every previously colonised part of the developed world except Australia. Everywhere else people have fought for their right to retain their distinct identity, including their right to keep and speak their own languages, their culture and their own religious practices.
The repressive and discriminate laws that we are subject to here in Australia would not be tolerated anywhere else in the free world. But here in Australia the government has spin doctors operating full time to hide the true state of play in respect of Aboriginal people. They are paid big dollars to convince the white Australian public that what they do for Aborigines is in the interest of the Aboriginal people and that special measures are necessary.
The reason for the use of the words ‘special measures’ is to continue with their assimilation policy of 1968. We Aboriginal people cannot permit this to continue without a fight.
Nationalist movements all over the world have erupted because of the oppressive rules that governed people and their lives that are designed and maintained by the dominant society. China and Iran are just two examples of places whose people are trying to win their freedom. We are no different here in Australia.
Enough is enough and if governments don’t want to talk to us then we will find a way to win our freedom to live as Aborigines, keeping our Dreaming, language, songs and culture alive for our future generations.
This is a right of all people, and it is our right to fight for our future.