Map of Aboriginal massacres shows that these colonial wars should be recognised
For the full map by the Centre for 21st Century Humanities and the Centre for the History of Violence, visit https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au
Mapping Aboriginal massacres makes it time to recognise the colonial wars, say leading historians http://www.smh.com.au/national/mapping-aboriginal-massacres-makes-it-time-to-recognise-the-colonial-wars-say-leading-historians-20170705-gx4y3m.html, Julie Power. 5 July 17, Almost every Aboriginal clan experienced massacres at the hands of early settlers in the “colonial wars”, according to the first stage of a new online mapping project.
So far the project has documented 150 massacres resulting in at least 6000 deaths in the early years of the colony. Most happened at dawn with a surprise attack on an Aboriginal camp where people “simply couldn’t defend themselves”, said University of Newcastle historian Professor Lyndall Ryan, who has been developing the online digital map for nearly four years.
Yet those who died defending their people and land have rarely been recognised. Professor Ryan and Tasmanian author Professor Henry Reynolds – whose books documented the “forgotten” and “silent” colonial wars against Aboriginal people – said it was time for the Australia War Memorial to recognise this war. Continue reading
Ten years of the Northern Territory intervention. Time it stopped
Ten years too long — stop the intervention https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/ten-years-too-long-stop-intervention Alice Springs, June 30, 2017
The following is a statement issued by participants of the StandUp2017 conference that concluded with a rally in Mbantua (Alice Springs) on June 26.
Rosalie Kunoth Monks: “You better believe it, when the Intervention first hit in 2007 community councils were decimated.”
Matthew Ryan: “Trying to get the government to listen to us, is like a brick wall.”
Elaine Peckham: “When the Intervention came they took away services from homelands. No health services. I had to move back to town. I didn’t want to.”
Yarrentye Arltere Larapinta Valley Town Camp: “Ten years too long. Ten years of hardship, neglect and broken promises. We want Aboriginal control for Aboriginal people by Aboriginal people.”
We need to keep our culture strong. We need to be in control of decision making. We want self-determination.
After ten years the Intervention has met none of its objectives. There are more people in jail, more children being taken away, there is more unemployment.
This StandUp2017 conference makes the following comments and call outs:
Repeal racist Intervention laws
Racist laws introduced through the Intervention have created apartheid and are still with us. Repeal the stronger futures laws.
Repeal changes to social security law that allow for control over our money. End the ban on consideration of customary law in bail and sentencing. Bring back the permit system.
Community governance Continue reading
Land use too often linked to the extinguishment of native title.
Land use deals kill native title: Pat Dodson, http://nit.com.au/land-use-deals-kill-native-title-pat-dodson/ Wendy Caccetta Opportunities offered to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people under Indigenous Land Use Agreements often come at too high a cost, WA Senator Pat Dodson has warned.
Senator Dodson said agreements — where native title holders and other parties can agree on the use of native title land for mutual benefit and economic development — is too often linked to the extinguishment of native title. Continue reading
Karina Lester: the Anangu story, and the Aboriginal fight against nuclear waste dumping
Karina Lester: Aboriginal people do not want a nuclear waste dump in South Australia http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/opinion/karina-lester-aboriginal-people-do-not-want-a-nuclear-waste-dump-in-south-australia/news-story/b180d3850f4285c208a334957ef5d6f0 Karina Lester, The Advertiser June 28, 2017 IT was a huge honour to travel to New York for United Nations negotiations on a historic treaty to ban nuclear weapons — a long journey from Walatina in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands in far north west South Australia.
Our Anangu story is not a happy one but it was a privilege to speak up at the UN — for my family and my own people and for indigenous peoples around the world who have suffered the effects of nuclear testing since the dawn of this nuclear age. I felt a great responsibility to acknowledge the many indigenous people who had lost lives and land, and suffered other harm and sickness, including my father Yami Lester.
Dad was blinded by the British nuclear testing at Emu Field in 1953 and has never laid eyes on his Country since, nor ever on his son and two daughters, his 12 grandchildren and two great grandchildren. I shared our family’s story and urged the 130 nations gathered there to produce a strong treaty that will not only ban these destructive weapons but formally recognise the disproportionate impact of nuclear weapon activities on indigenous peoples.
Yet, in the back of my mind in New York, amid all that history making and all that hope, was the knowledge that this fight is not even close to being over at home, that we never seem to be able to draw to a close this dangerous industry in South Australia.
Pitjantjatjara, Yankunytjatjara, Kokatha, Adnyamathanha and other Aboriginal people of South Australia have been fighting this nuclear problem now for decades, since my father heard a British official falsely claiming that Anangu had been consulted on the tests which sent the ‘black mist’ which poisoned our people and land.
Dad’s campaigning helped pave the way for the Royal Commission into British Nuclear Tests in Australia in 1985. But it didn’t take long for this injustice to be forgotten, for our traditional lands to once more to be seen as empty wastelands and for this struggle to become intergenerational.
In 1998 the Howard Government announced its plan to build a national radioactive waste dump in the SA Outback. This time it was the Kupa Piti Kungka Tjuta, senior Aboriginal woman from Coober Pedy — among them my Kami (nana) Eileen Kampakuta Brown — who had to step up for the fight with their “Irati Wanti — the poison, leave it” campaign. It took a huge toll on those old women but they had learnt of the danger from their experience of Maralinga and Emu Field.
Then two years ago came the threat again, with the Royal Commission into the expansion of the nuclear fuel cycle in South Australia and the proposal to ship, store and bury up to one-third of the world’s high-level long-lived radioactive waste. Where? Not in Adelaide, of course.
But as my Kami said, this radioactive risk is not just a problem for our mob, it’s a problem for all South Australians, and the proposal was resoundingly rejected.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has been looking at Adnyamathanha country in the Flinders Ranges for a national low and intermediate-level nuclear dump. Facing strong Aboriginal resistance, it is also proposing a site on the Eyre Peninsula. Aboriginal people are not the only opponents of nuclear waste, but we have borne the brunt of this industry and have intimate knowledge of its costs.
My father lost his eyesight because of nuclear weapons testing, but he has never lost his vision of a cleaner and safer future free of nuclear threats from weapons and waste. It’s time this country and this state shared that vision.
Karina Lester is a Yankunytjatjara Anangu woman, who works with the University of Adelaide’s Mobile Language Team as the Aboriginal Co-Manager and Language Worker. She is a member of the Natural Resources Management Council
United Nations concerned over impact of climate change on Aboriginals: lack of indigenous inclusion in policy-making
WGAR News, 30 June 17 UN ‘raised concerns over disproportionate impact of climate change on Australia’s Aboriginal population & called for gov to engage Indigenous peoples when designing policy. ‘In the last review of Aus’s obligations to the covenant in 2009, the committee raised issues over domestic emissions & Indigenous peoples, but this was the first time coal mining was singled out‘
Australian and International Hurdles to Adani Coal Mine Expansion
Final chapter in Adani loan deal, Saturday Paper, Karen Middleton , 24 June 17 “……..While the Queensland government has promised a royalties concession if the development goes ahead, it has also decided not to process the NAIF loan if approved – something that may require federal legislation to circumvent.
And for the Carmichael mine to proceed, the company must have concluded an Indigenous land use agreement, or ILUA, with the area’s native title holders.
Last week, the federal government and Labor combined to pass legislation to reverse a Federal Court ruling that all members of a registered native title claimant group in any relevant area were required to sign an ILUA for it to have force.
The move affected agreements well beyond the Adani ILUA and was welcomed by some Indigenous groups and opposed by others.
That followed Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s promise to Adani owner Gautam Adani during a meeting in India earlier this year that he would fix the native title problems that were preventing the development from proceeding,
But the Wangan and Jagalingou traditional owners are challenging the ILUA on three other grounds. The court hearing has been set down for next year.
OPPONENTS OF THE MINE ARE GEARING UP TO ARGUE THAT SUCH GLOBAL BAD PUBLICITY SHOULD BE GROUNDS FOR REFUSAL.
Originally, Adani had said it expected to achieve financial close on its Carmichael project by December this year. But recently that date was revised to March – the same month the court is due to hear the ILUA challenge.
What is not clear is whether there is a NAIF deadline by which an applicant must prove it has fulfilled all requirements, or whether an application can remain live for as long as that takes……
In the latest public criticism of the whole proposal, an international group of high-profile conservationists wrote to Malcolm Turnbull late this week urging the government not to proceed.
The Ocean Elders, which include ocean explorer Jean-Michel Cousteau, marine biologist Dr Sylvia Earle, businessman Richard Branson and Jordan’s Queen Noor, wrote that the mine would worsen damage to the Great Barrier Reef that Australia, as its custodian, had a global obligation to protect.
The group’s spokeswoman, marine biologist Earle, told ABC Radio that Australia should reject fossil fuels and hence the Carmichael mine, despite its advanced state of official approval.
“It’s never too late as long as the people and as long as rational individuals with power can change course, now that we know what we know,” Earle said.
A prime ministerial spokesman declined to comment on the letter.
One of the conditions of the NAIF approving a loan is that it must not be likely to “cause damage to the Commonwealth Government’s reputation or that of a relevant State or Territory government”.
Opponents of the mine are gearing up to argue that such global bad publicity should be grounds for refusal.
In her speech to the Cairns conference, Sharon Warburton said the NAIF must both reflect government policy and be independent of it.
“First NAIF must align with Commonwealth policy, and that is a whole-of-government position, remembering it is taxpayer funds we are deploying,” Warburton said. “Secondly – importantly – we cannot lend funds if all regulation at both a Commonwealth and state level are not in place.
“The other tremendously important parameter under which we operate is that it was set up to be an independent body making decisions independently of all outside influence.”
Given the attempts at influence being made on all sides of the argument, that may prove to be a challenge. https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/economy/2017/06/24/final-chapter-adani-loan-deal/14982264004830
Australia’s Karina Lester at United Nations conference on a nuclear weapons ban treaty
South Australian woman Karina Lester presents anti-nuclear speech to United Nations in New York http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/south-australian-woman-karina-lester-presents-antinuclear-speech-to-united-nations-in-new-york/news-story/be7b9ecb4ae5e0f0c568908f117c4be9 Erin Jones, The AdvertiserJune 23, 2017
KARINA Lester’s family remembers the ground shaking and a black mist rolling towards them when nuclear tests were carried out at Emu Field, in the state’s Far North. The residents of Walatina community, 150km south of the explosion, were given no notice of the British tests, in 1953, but they would suffer from lifelong health affects.
Her father, Yankunytjatjara elder Yami Lester, became blind as a result of the testing, while others suffered skin infections, auto-immune diseases and severe vomiting.
Ms Lester shared the poignant story with world leaders in New York this month in a four minute address to the United Nations conference on a nuclear weapons ban treaty. “It was certainly a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to present to the UN,” Ms Lester said. “It’s really important to be able to share these stories otherwise we forget. “We learn so much about world wars but we don’t hear the history of what happened here.”
The treaty talks have been supported by more than 120 countries, but Australia and those with nuclear powers, including Russia and the United States have boycotted the conference.
Countries which signed the treaty would be forbidden from developing or manufacturing nuclear weapons and they would need to get rid of any weapons they already possess.
“It was disappointing as an Australian person to speak about what happened in our own backyard, when your country wasn’t even in the room,” Ms Lester said.
“This is an opportunity for nations to get together and completely ban nuclear weapons, instead of spending trillions of dollars to improve their technology.”
Ms Lester, of North Plympton, also took part in sessions with Hiroshima survivors to further share stories of the how nuclear weapons affect humanity.
“You can’t help but be moved when you hear those stories from people who survived and what they remember from when the blast when off,” she said.
Talks on the global treaty to outlaw nuclear weapons conclude on July 7.
Aboriginal leader, previous supporter of Adani coal project, now rejects it
“I want to withdraw my signature on the Ilua,” he said. “I take this position because I do not believe that the Ilua adequately compensates us for the destruction the project will wreak upon the traditional culture and lands of our people.”
He said that most in the meeting, which was boycotted by those opposing the deal, were “people I did not recognise as being members of our claim group”.
“Most importantly, I believe that QSNTS failed us by not ensuring that we were properly and independently advised on the benefits of entering the Adani Ilua,” Dallen said. “Only the benefits of entering the Ilua were discussed.””..…
Adani mine loses majority support of traditional owner representatives
Wangan and Jagalingou representative who had backed an Indigenous land use agreement now says he opposes the mine, Guardian, Joshua Robertson, 15 June 17 Adani has lost majority support from traditional owner representatives for a land access deal for its Queensland mine, casting doubt on moves to implement the agreement.
Craig Dallen, a Wangan and Jagalingou representative who last year backed an Indigenous land use agreement (Ilua) with the miner, now says he opposes a deal that will not make up for “the destruction the project will wreak upon the traditional culture and lands of our people”.
Dallen’s reversal, which came while he was sidelined from the decision-making process while in custody in a Queensland jail, has left the W&J representative group deadlocked on the Adani deal, with six in favour and six against.
But federal government native title amendments passed on Wednesday mean Adani’s agreement, unlike all future Iluas, do not need majority support to proceed. Continue reading
Traditional Owners slam passage of Native Title amendments
Traditional Owners fighting Adani’s proposed coal mine have expressed profound disappointment at the passage of Attorney General Brandis’ amendments to the Native Title Act, stressing that while Mabo’s legacy has been diminished they will continue to fight for their rights.
Senior spokesperson for the W&J Traditional Owners Council, Adrian Burragubba, says, “Adani’s problems with the Wangan and Jagalingou people are not solved this week. The trial to decide the fate of Adani’s supposed deal with the Wangan and Jagalingou Traditional Owners is scheduled for the Federal Court in March 2018.
“Our people are the last line of legal defence against this mine and its corrosive impact on our rights, and the destruction of country that would occur.
“Senator Brandis has been disingenuous in prosecuting his argument for these changes to native title laws, while the hands of native title bureaucrats and the mining lobby are all over the outcome.
“This swift overturning of a Federal Court decision, without adequate consultation with Indigenous people, was a significant move, not a mere technical consideration as the Turnbull Government has tried to make out.
“It is appalling and false for George Brandis to pretend that by holding a ‘workshop’ with the CEOs of the native title service bodies, he has the unanimous agreement of Traditional Owners across Australia. No amount of claimed ‘beseeching’ by the head of the Native Title Council, Glen Kelly, can disguise this.
“The public were not properly informed about the bill, and nor were Indigenous people around the country, who were not consulted and did not consent to these changes.
“We draw the line today. We declare our right to our land. There is no surrender. There is no land use agreement. We are the people from that land. We’re the rightful Traditional Owners of Wangan and Jagalingou country, and we are in court to prove that others are usurping our rights”, he said.
Spokesperson for the W&J Traditional Owners Council, Ms Murrawah Johnson, says, “Whatever else this change does, we know that the Turnbull Government went into overdrive for Adani’s interests.
“Brandis’ intervention in our court case challenging the sham ILUA was about Adani. Most of what Senator Matt Canavan had to say in argueing his ill-informed case for native title changes was about Adani. The Chairman of Senate Committee inquiring into the bill, Senator Ian McFarlane, referring to the native title amendments as “the Adani bill” was about Adani. And the PM telling Chairman Gautam Adani that he’d fix native title was about Adani”.
“We are continuing to fight Adani in court and our grounds are strong. If anyone tells you this is settled because the bill was passed, they are lying”, she said.
Adrian Burragubba says, “The Labor Opposition seems to understand this, even though they supported passage of the bill. Senator Pat Dodson went so far as to say this bill does not provide some kind of green light for the Adani mine, as some suggest.
“Pat Dodson acknowledged that W&J have several legal actions afoot against Adani and we are glad that in the midst of this dismal response to the rights of Indigenous people some MPs, including the Greens who voted against the bill, recognise the serious claim we have to justice.
Mr Dodson said in the Senate that: “most of this litigation will be entirely unaffected by the passage of this bill. In particular, there are very serious allegations of fraud that have been made against Adani regarding the processes under which agreements with the Wangan and Jagalingou people were purportedly reached. And those proceedings, which may impact on the validity of any ILUA, will only commence hearings in March next year. Other legal action is also underway, including a case challenging the validity of the licences issued by the Queensland government.”
This week researchers from the University of Queensland released a report titled ‘Unfinished Business: Adani, the state, and the Indigenous rights struggle of the Wangan and Jagalingou Traditional Owners Council‘.
Professor Marcia Langton promoting Big Coal, not Aboriginal Rights
The problem is that Langton’s argument boils down to mining, good, anything that stands in its way, bad. That’s why it falls apart when faced with Adani’s proposed coal mine in the Galilee Basin, slap-bang in the middle of which is Wangan and Jagalingou country.
Adani’s proposed mine has become the Coalition’s cargo cult and its free-marketeer ministers have happily ditched their principles to promote it, fund it and change laws (including the Native Title Act) to try and force it to happen.
For this treatment to come from a non-Aboriginal person would be suspect, but for it to come from a fellow Indigenous Australian is surely unforgivable.
Why Marcia Langton is wrong on Adani https://independentaustralia.net/business/business-display/why-marcia-langton-is-wrong-on-adani,10396 Tom Allen 13 June 2017 For all her powerful and peerless leadership of Aboriginal rights, Professor Marcia Langton has it wrong on Adani.
Her speech to the Minerals Council of Australia (MCA) last week made headlines because she provocatively accused environmentalists of wanting to send Aboriginal Australians back to terra nullius. That’s simply wrong. But perhaps just as bad is the fact that, just as the #StopAdani campaign is gearing up, Ms Langton was shilling for Big Coal. Continue reading
Marcia Langton “poorly informed” on Adani coal mine, says leading native title lawyer
Leading Indigenous lawyer hits back at Marcia Langton over Adani Tony McAvoy says traditional owners are ‘proud and independent’ and are not being used by anti-mining activists to block the $16bn mine, Guardian, Joshua Robertson, 9 June 17, One of Australia’s leading native title lawyers has spoken publicly for the first time as a traditional owner fighting to stop the Adani mine, a campaign he said was driven by “proud and independent people” who were among the best-informed Indigenous litigants in the country.
Tony McAvoy SC, who became Australia’s first Indigenous silk in 2015, said the Wangan and Jagalingou people were keenly aware of how their priorities differed from environmentalist allies in a battle to preserve their Queensland country from one of the world’s largest proposed coalmines.
McAvoy dismissed claims by the prominent Indigenous academic Marcia Langton that Indigenous people had become “collateral damage” as the “environmental industry” hijacked the Adani issue.
He said the rhetoric of Langton and Warren Mundine, who likened anti-Adani campaigners to colonial oppressors running roughshod over Indigenous self-determination, “serves a purpose for them but is just so inaccurate”.
The barrister said to suggest that “the greens are puppet masters pulling the strings and we’re somehow puppets” was wildly off the mark and disrespectful to the many families opposing the mine, including his.
The W&J are the only Indigenous group in Australia to have, in McAvoy, a senior counsel with expertise in native title law within their ranks.
“We are likely to be one of the best informed claimant groups in the country, we have many people who are experienced in native title, including my own input, and representation by an extraordinary team of lawyers,” he said.
McAvoy is part of a contingent within W&J who have mounted legal challenges to an Indigenous land use agreement (Ilua) with Adani, contesting the right of pro-Adani representatives to approve a deal previously spurned by their claim group. The miner resurrected an Ilua last year with majority support in the W&J native title applicant, then sought to register it with the native title tribunal.
But the W&J opponents challenged the deal in the federal court, on grounds including that the pro-Adani applicant members were voted out in a claim group meeting, and that a rival meeting that endorsed the Adani deal was not legitimate.
Then Adani’s hopes suffered a blow with the McGlade native title case, which found that an Ilua was invalid because not all Indigenous representatives had signed it.
The shock precedent prompted the government to put up a bill changing native title legislation to safeguard what it argued were hundreds of Iluas thrown into doubt because they had a majority but not all the signatures of claimants.
The bill also contains amendments that would pave the way for Adani’s unregistered, contested Ilua.
McAvoy said Langton was “very poorly informed” on the Adani issue.
He and a swathe of the W&J argue there should be no rush to pass law changes dealing with critical issues around Indigenous property rights through future land access deals.
McAvoy argues for “splitting the bill” to validate Iluas already registered with the National Native Title Tribunal, but not those unregistered, such as Adani’s. McAvoy said he hoped this proposal would find favour with Labor and crossbench senators, with the bill due for voting as early as next week.
But the group raises its own funds for its legal challenges.
“And more than that, we are very, very aware that our interests of preserving our country are not entirely aligned with the green interests,” he said……..
A land access deal is crucial to Adani gaining finance for the mine, initially needing $3.3bn.
The miner last week cited the end of this year as its deadline for finance. But the federal court this week signalled a trial to decide the fate of Adani’s deal with the W&J would take place in March 2018.
McAvoy said that even if the Senate “amends the Native Title Act in the way proposed [by the government], that proceeding is still to run its course”. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jun/09/leading-indigenous-lawyer-hits-back-at-marcia-langton-over-adani
Professor Marcia Langton used to support Aboriginal empowerment, not the power of mining companies
In regards to mining on Aboriginal land, there are two primary concerns. Firstly, are the economic benefits as good as they sound? And secondly, what power do Aboriginal communities have in the agreement-making process?
While Prof. Langton has convincingly argued for many years that Aboriginal communities are not receiving their fair share of mining revenues, in the Boyer Lectures her proposed solutions to this economic vulnerability are largely to maintain the power of the mining industry
Responses to Marcia Langton’s Boyer Lectures http://www.foe.org.au/langton
Prof. Langton used to sit on the Australian Uranium Association’s so-called ‘Indigenous Dialogue Group’. Other mining companies support her work as discussed below.
[ I’m thinking that Marcia Langton might now have to be be included in the hierarchy of Australia’s nuclear spinners? – C.M. ]
Indigenous communities, conservation and the resource boom Friends of the Earth Australia, Nick McClean and Dawn Wells Chain Reaction #117, April 2013 In the recent Boyer Lectures, Prof. Marcia Langton argued that mining is providing Indigenous communities with an opportunity to move out of the economic margins and grow into a new middle class of wealth and opportunity.
But is mining the only way forward for Indigenous communities seeking to develop economically sustainable futures? And are supporters of conservation committing an act of racism, as she suggests?
We can begin by looking to Prof. Langton’s own publications. In an article published in the Journal of Political Ecology in 2005, Prof. Langton and her colleagues brought together research from across Australia, the Middle-East, Indonesia and the United Nation’s chief conservation agency, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Assessing the benefits and pitfalls of developing community-based conservation programs in partnership with Indigenous peoples, the conclusions were clear − Australia is currently one of the few countries where Indigenous led conservation programs are proving successful.
To quote: “Australia has in relation to certain key national parks, taken a lead role in the development of joint management agreements with Indigenous groups” (p.35) and “we also argue, in contrast to many critiques of community-based conservation elsewhere, that community-oriented protected areas are delivering significant benefits to Indigenous peoples in Australia” (p.24).
Based on a number of detailed examples, Prof. Langton and her colleagues argued that Australia’s Indigenous Protected Area (IPA) program in particular provides significant potential for Indigenous communities to develop livelihoods that are economically sustainable and culturally relevant. Continue reading
Traditional Owners fighting Adani mine query Labor’s support for Native Title Bill
http://wanganjagalingou.com.au/traditional-owners-fighting-adani-mine-query-labors-support-for-native-title-bill/ “Responding to reports that Labor has come to an agreement with the Turnbull government which will see passage of the contentious Native Title Bill in the Senate next week, Traditional Owners fighting Adani’s mine are calling on Opposition Leader Bill Shorten to outline what consultation has occurred with Indigenous people which makes his party satisfied the Bill should now become law.
“Shadow Minister Assisting for Resources, Mr Tim Hammond, is reported to have told a Perth resources conference today there was now a “settled position” with the Government and that the Opposition envisaged the bill would be passed next week.
“Senior spokesperson for the Wangan and Jagalingou (W&J) Traditional Owners Council, Adrian Burragubba, says ““Labor made a bunch of noise about the failure of the Attorney General to conduct proper grassroots consultation with Aboriginal people on these important changes to native title laws.
““People deserve to hear from Labor what, if anything, has changed since mid May when it refused to vote for Adani’s Native Title Bill because consultation had been so shabby and amendments were all over the shop.
““Until Labor has been provided with evidence by the Turnbull government of appropriate consultation,
and the Senate has seen the Bill as proposed, it should refuse to back it,” Mr Burragubba said.
Adani ‘investment decision’ meaningless without Indigenous consent
Federal Court sets date for W&J litigation against Adani’s sham ILUA for March 2018
Native Title Bill still to pass, but won’t stop court action
http://wanganjagalingou.com.au/adani-investment-decision-meaningless-without-indigenous-consent/
On the day the Federal Court sets a hearing date for Traditional Owners fighting Adani’s proposed coal mine,
the Wangan and Jagalingou (W&J) Traditional Owners Council has labelled
Adani’s announcement in Townsville as disingenuous.
“Senior spokesperson for the Wangan and Jagalingou (W&J)Traditional Owners Council, Adrian Burragubba, says
““Adani can put on whatever song and dance they like but the reality is that we have never consented to Adani’s mine being constructed on our land.
““The company and the Queensland Government do not have an Indigenous Land Use Agreement with our people.
We are fighting this mine of mass destruction, and no matter what the Senate does in its next sitting in terms of voting for the Native Title Bill, the Federal Court will hear our case against Adani’s phony deal.”
““Adani is going nowhere fast. They have no money for their project, and they don’t have the crucial Traditional Owners’ consent they need to build it. We have them in the Federal Court until March 2018 at least.”
“Members of the Wangan and Jagalingou Registered Native Title Claimant are currently in the Federal Court seeking to strike out Adani’s purported Indigenous Land Use Agreement [ILUA],
filed by Adani Mining with the National Native Title Tribunal.
An ILUA has been opposed by the native title claim group on three occasions since 2012.
“Youth spokesperson for the W&J Traditional Owners Council, Ms Murrawah Johnson,
giving a keynote address at the National Native Title Conference in Townsville tomorrow, says
““Adani’s approach seems to be ‘fake it until you make it’, but
the reality is that they can’t and won’t proceed in the face of our resistance”. …
1 This month
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
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