More than 150 people, including Reef town locals and traditional owners, gathered outside the Brisbane headquarters of Indian mining corporation Adani on July 16.
They were there in solidarity with Juru and Birri Traditional Owners, whose lands are covered by Adani’s planned projects. Juru elder, Aunty Carol Prior spoke of her people’s opposition to the proposed Carmichael coalmine, which would not only accelerate climate change and pose a threat to the Reef, but had serious implications for the cultural traditions of the local communities.
Following a traditional dance of cleansing, a delegation proceeded to the Adani offices and presented thousands of individually written pledges to continue a campaign of civil disobedience until the Adani operation is called off.
As she presented the pledges Aunty Carol said: “All of those pledges come from the heart and from everybody here who's got the guts and the bloody balls to stand up and fight you all the way."
The infrastructure would cut through four different tribal lands, Aunty Carol said later. "In some areas, it goes right through sacred sites, sacred waterholes," she said. "And in my country it's going through 30m away from a rock art that's thousands of years old."
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