Voter suppression in Australia’s deep north?
Last week two Aboriginal men—Matthew Ryan and Ross Mandi—filed a complaint to the Australian Human Rights Commission (the AHRC) against the Australian Electoral Commission (the AEC) alleging that the AEC has effectively suppressed the Aboriginal vote in remote areas in the Northern Territory.
How good was racism in the ’70s and ’80s! A short history of bigotry in the Northern Territory
Keep Australia Clean (Kill a Coon); If Abos want land they should buy the bastard the same as the whites do. They have no rights to any land whatever. If they don’t want to work under our system – let ‘em starve; People with black legs won’t be served; and Buy some Coon cheese today for catching black mice: Noticeboard, Daly Waters Hotel, 1978.
“We, the leaders of the Gurindji people …” On This Day, 1967
It was not until 16 August 1975 that negotiations with Vesteys, owners of the Wave Hill lease, were completed, and the lease for the Gurindji tribal land at Wattie Creek was handed to Vincent Lingiari, leader of the Gurindji.
Finding Lost Mudburra Art. Part One
Not a lot has changed since I last looked at Elliott/Kulumindini six years ago—it is still stuck in an administrative worm hole. Services from all levels of government fall between the jurisdictional cracks often because Elliott is equidistant from the major Northern Territory service and administrative centres of Darwin and Alice Springs.
Tree of The Week—The Top End’s self-decorating Xmas tree, Xanthostemon paradoxus
While the settlers may have struggled to find a suitable name for Xanthostemon paradoxus, it is unsurprising that local Aboriginal language groups have no shortage of names—and uses— for this tree.
‘Murdered by a person or persons name unknown.’ The unsolved deaths of Nabbutta Abbott Nabarula and David Charlie. Part 2
Lois Nambajimba: Then I heard people singing out they was crying. Then saw those people shaking. I saw that woman first that one that died. I saw that woman first drop and then shake.
‘Murdered by a person or persons name unknown.’ The unsolved deaths of Nabbutta Abbott Nabarula and David Charlie. Part One.
The neck is stretched out, the head thrown back, the legs straight and stiff. The fits are brought on or made worse by the slightest touch, sound or light. Finally, one dreadful seizure follows another, until they are continuous and death ensues.
‘They took our culture – now there is no law’
It was late November 2010, one of those red-hot November days that only the Western Desert can turn on. Over six hundred people travelled for days from far and wide to bury young Jampijinpa at the small town of Nyirripi, a four-and-a-half hour dusty drive west from Alice Springs on rough dirt roads.
One night in K-Town: a den of iniquity, Shakespeare’s rose, police incompetence and a cheeky trouble-maker who was “no Jack The Ripper”
It is a matter of some sadness to the Court to have been involved in a matter which has so many unsatisfactory and unsavoury actions of the police force of the Northern Territory ... It may be that the defendant can be described as a serial pest. He may be provocative and cheeky and a trouble causer. He is 19 years old. He is not Jack the Ripper.
Jack Ah Kit. Inaugural speech to the NT Legislative Assembly. 10 October 1995
I am aware that it is not normal in a maiden parliamentary speech to raise contentious issues, but these are not normal times. Let us talk about traditions. Let us look at the traditions of the Country Liberal Party and the people who run it. These people know their traditions well and the most hallowed of them is to raise issues of race at every possible opportunity, and there is no better opportunity than at election time.