AUSTRALIA
NT intervention based on “big lie” says journalist
Annie Nielsen, Sydney
23 May 2009
Prominent journalist Jeff McMullen questioned the Northern Territory intervention at a forum organised by Reconciliation for Western Sydney on May 20 in Wentworthville.
McMullen said the Indigenous policies of the Rudd government continue many of the worst policies of the previous Howard government.
He said the new government push was to move most funding into the larger Aboriginal communities, drawing more and more people to what will be called “Territory Growth Towns” [see article on page 8].
This is despite the fact that most Indigenous people in more than 500 smaller remote communities and homelands prefer to live on their own ancient ancestral lands with its special cultural significance.
McMullen said after having their land taken from them by white people in the 19th century, NT Aborigines got it back in the 1970s. But now the government wants to control it again through 40-year leases.
The intervention was supposedly started due to child abuse in Indigenous communities. Yet after inspections of more than 13,000 children there was no evidence of the existence of “paedophile rings” as claimed by the Howard government. This had been exposed as a cynical “big lie”, McMullen said.
He said the lack of government consultation is a major problem. The government has recently pledged to sign the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. It commits the government to consult with Indigenous people and to allow them to control their own destiny on their own lands.
McMullen also spoke of his involvement in a scheme called Australian Indigenous Mentoring Experience which is active on schools and four universities. He said he felt it could help a highly educated and confident generation of young Aboriginal people who would carry on the struggle for equality.
