BY CORRINNE BATT-RAWDEN AND TONY ILTIS
LISMORE — "Since John Howard said that there was no stolen generations, communities have gotten angry, and the people of Lismore have taken to the streets ... We can beat racism", Edda Lampis of the Northern Rivers Anti-Racism Coalition told a lively crowd of 200 rallying against government racism on May 13.
The rally was one of a series of actions in the region that have mobilised indigenous and non-indigenous people against the Coalition government's racist "wedge politics". A rally of 100 people was held in Nimbin on April 15.
The Lismore rally was welcomed by Bunjalung elder Auntie Agnes. Other speakers included Tasmanian Aboriginal academic Errol West, who was scathing about Australia's human rights record and described the government's reconciliation process as "the behaviour of bullies".
Local elder and university lecturer Ron Herren called for a fight back against the Howard government because it was "turning the clock back instead of forward [and] not only indigenous people are affected".
As an example, all the speakers passionately opposed the government's abuses of refugees' human rights. Bunjalung elder Auntie Faye said, "We must support our sisters and brothers that are doing it tough overseas", while Kath O'Driscoll from Action in Solidarity with Indonesia and East Timor condemned the government's imprisonment without trial of refugees arriving by sea and its mass deportations of Kosovar and East Timorese refugees.
Ema Corro from Resistance called on secondary students to show their opposition to racism by walking out of school on May 26 to link up with a Sorry Day anniversary walkout by Southern Cross University students, part of a national week of action organised locally by the Student Representative Council's Indigenous Students Network.
The May 18 Northern Star devoted its entire front page, headlined "Uni Radicals Target High Schools!", to the call for a walkout, reporting with outrage that Resistance activists had leafleted Lismore High School students, who are "just schoolkids who didn't understand".
To get involved in the protests, which will include performances by punk bands and indigenous artists, and mime, phone 6622 0103.