Barkly Shire dumped 3000 litres of raw sewage at the local tip at the Northern Territory Aboriginal Ampilatwatja township on April 6. The township is a "prescribed community" under the Northern Territory Intervention.
One of the contractors employed to dump the sewage fell sick and was later flown to hospital. Ampilatwatja residents say the contractors were not given training to safely deal with the sewage. Gloves, masks or other safety equipment were not used during the job.
As of April 8, the sewage still lay uncovered in the tip.
This is not the first time residents have had to deal with poor sewerage facilities. Alyawarr spokesperson Richard Downs led a community walk-off from Ampilatwatja in July 2009 after government agencies failed to deal with sewage overflowing into the township's streets.
Local works manager Mark Fordham refused to cooperate with the orders from Paul Stevenson, the temporary Shire Services manager, to dump the sewage.
Fordham said: "This just shows clearly the attitude the shire and the intervention have to Aboriginal people — they want to keep people in the dark. They have consistently refused to employ local people or pay the proper wages that are needed to deliver services here in Ampilatwatja.
"Now the new manager decides to push the sewage problem out of sight, out of mind by dumping it where people will get sick instead of paying the money to truck it to Alice Springs."
Downs said the dumping of the sewage is another reason why community control must be restored to the Alyawarr people. "Aboriginal land seized by the federal government through the NT intervention must be returned to the community immediately", he said.
"Under Jenny Macklin's new intervention laws, compulsory five-year leases are being classified as 'special measures', which we still cannot challenge using the Racial Discrimination Act.
"They say these leases are to improve the living conditions of the community and
particularly the children — yet raw sewage has been dumped near our
school for them to play in.
"The government business manager and the new shire manager must resign. They have created mass unemployment here and contract out almost all the work. For the rest, they are forcing our people to work for the Basics Card.
"After three years of intervention we have been left with the most appalling living and working conditions in Australia. It's clear they don't want to Close the Gap — they want to close our communities down and force people into town."
A community protest was due to be held at Ampilatwatja on April 13 to demand an end to the NT intervention.