Antinuclear

Australia’s Kimberley – paradise or a Dubai-like industrial hub?

community opposition to the project is growing rapidly. A loose coalition of environmentalist groups has launched a national campaign to stop the project, supported by Aboriginal people desperate to protect sacred heritage sites and ancient graves.

Battle for the Kimberley SMH, Jan Mayman May 24, 2012 “….. ONCE it was paradise, an enchanted land of wild beauty, with endless beaches of dazzling white sand beneath magnificent red cliffs along the Kimberley coast. For more than a century people from all over the world were drawn there by the pearl-rich sea. In the old port of Broome, they settled and intermarried, creating a place of racial harmony unique in Australia,
with its own language, cuisine and music. In more recent times tourists have flocked there to enjoy its idyllic charm.

But everything is changing. The West Australian government wants to turn Broome into another Dubai, with a $35 billion liquefied natural gas plant 60 kilometres north of the town at pristine James Price Point. If it wins federal government approval it will be the world’s
biggest, producing 12 million tonnes of liquefied gas a year. But the project, driven by an international consortium led by Australia’s Woodside Petroleum, has bitterly divided Broome’s 16,000 residents……

community opposition to the project is growing rapidly. A loose coalition of environmentalist groups has launched a national campaign to stop the project, supported by Aboriginal people desperate to protect sacred heritage sites and ancient graves.
WA Premier Colin Barnett had threatened to compulsorily acquire the
land without compensation if Aboriginal Traditional Owners refused to
sign contracts that cleared the way for work to begin at James Price
Point.
The traditional owners’ representative body corporate, the Kimberley
Land Council, signed a series of agreements with the government and
Woodside last year, a deal that left many Broome people of all races
shocked and angry.
Some Aboriginal leaders signed reluctantly, convinced it was their
only way to a better life. They were promised benefits worth $1.5
billion over the next 30 years in the form of better housing,
education, jobs and health care. “Why should we have to give up our
land to get the kind of benefits all Australians are entitled to
anyway?” says Dr Anne Poelina, an indigenous woman and deputy shire
president of Broome, who was speaking as a private individual. (Mayor
Graeme Campbell was out of town and unavailable for comment.)…..
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/battle-for-the-kimberley-20120523-1z5fb.html#ixzz1vp43Gpi0

May 24, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | General News