Racism and Corruption in the Northern Territory of Australia - Micro/Macro

fixed

Racism and Corruption in the
Northern Territory of Australia.
(Micro/Macro)
By Mick Lambe, 10 March, 2001
http://www.freespeech.org/pariah/pages/Pariah-Article

PARIAH - People Against Racism In Aboriginal Homelands was formed in 1998 to combat racism on the Cox Peninsula in the Northern Territory of Australia. I have lived between the racist run town of Klandorah (formerly known as Mandorah) and the Belyuen Aboriginal community for ten years on the Cox Peninsula. The local non-Aboriginal people (Territorians) had in the main, accepted the presence of a freethinking individual (given their bigotry and insularity) because whatever our belief systems, we share comparatively the same isolation and rugged conditions.

The conditions in which myself and my partners have lived, are probably best explained, by the fact that the Australian Army used the region for survival training. Topsoil and water are nonexistent - (why I labour the thefts of our water tanks and the recent 'water tax') - necessitating a seven mile haul to get water.

The formation of the Cox Peninsula Community Government Council in 1996 - which quickly consolidated itself, using the age old (and race based) tactics of social status and marginalization - soon changed a reasonably tolerant community into the bastion of racism and injustice it has become. It is sad to see people who once welcomed me in their homes, now wishing I was dead. Sad but unavoidable.

That a "feral" would dare to challenge the authority of people who consider themselves innately superior, is just something they are unable to deal with. Democracy does not include blacks and their allies in the Northern Territory.

The Aboriginal people, the poorest materially, but the wealthiest spiritually, of all Australians, are just a joy, which makes the racism they face daily, all that more despicable and unjust. Their acceptance of me is probably my proudest achievement, considering the political and social sensitivity of PARIAH's campaign.

We Europeans have a long way to go, before we can claim their kinship to this land. I have danced at funeral ceremony daubed in ochre, hunted and fished with and shared in many of the ups and downs of the Belyuen people, but I would never claim the knowledge they live so easily. To be accepted as family and a member of their community is recognition of a relationship, based on shared oppression.

Living in the middle of an Aboriginal land claim has always been a highly contentious and political act given the paternalistic (and profitable) belief by non-Aboriginals, that Aboriginal people are incapable (or even have the right) of managing their own affairs. A twenty two year legal battle for control of the Cox Peninsula (the Kenbi claim) recently ended in victory for the Aboriginal people and vindicated my claim (to non-Aboriginal people) that I live on Aboriginal land.

This is another reason the local townspeople have destroyed our home and threaten violence if we return. These people are incapable of logical rebuttal. A universal condition of people clinging to the atavistic worldviews of militarism and racism.

The entrenched racism and corruption of a Country Liberal Party that has been in power continuously since self-government twenty three years ago, has taken PARIAH from fighting local dress codes - publicly admitted to be enacted, "...To keep the blackfellas out" - to analyzing the geopolitical racism of Australia's involvement in Bougainville, Burma and East Timor.

The systemic nature of Australian racism explains why twenty or so NT and Federal Government departments are suddenly involved in excluding, discrediting, intimidating and silencing our tiny, but very vocal and confrontationist, anti-racism organization.

It is fear. Fear of political persecution in every aspect of ones life - that sees groups such as ours forced to operate on the fringes of Australian society.

The Australian populace has historically embraced a creed of white supremacism. The "White Australia Policy" an immigration policy to keep Australia white and Miscegenation laws - a Hitlerian concept of eugenics designed to prevent the dilution of the white race - continued into the 1960's.

The basic human rights for Indigenous people to vote, be recognized as Australian citizens, own land in Australia and enter a licensed premises without a permit (the Dog Tag) were only enacted as recently as 1967.

PARIAH are not seeking votes, so we can talk frankly about the mass culpability of the Australian people, in allowing the day-to-day persecution of indigenous people (and their allies) both here and overseas.

To understand racism in Australia, one must understand the secrecy that surrounds it.

The historic bonding of racism and secrecy in Australia was necessitated by the "do-gooders" who interpreted and extended the "Thou shalt not kill" commandment to include people, the same colour as Jesus Christ. The hanging of Europeans who blatantly killed Aboriginal people, helped establish the new 'rules of the game.'

The use of poisoned flour and the burning of black corpses in the wilderness after "nigger hunts" presenting a less problematical genocide to the Authorities, who considered the extinction of the feral indigenous people to be a pleasant certainty.

Such 'humanitarian killjoys' are still described as "do-gooders" by racist apologists in Australia. The term regained popularity during the mandatory sentencing debate in the Northern Territory. The incarceration 'mix' in the Northern Territory is about 80% Aboriginal. While Aboriginal people comprise only 25% of the Territory's population.

Obviously a new law that made incarceration more likely, was going to impact mainly on Aboriginal people. Denis Burke the populist (read racist) leader of the NT has admitted this and even stated that mandatory sentencing was not introduced to cut crime. One person replied to this racist "do-gooder" barrage, with, it beats being a "do-badder."

The NT Country Liberal Party, the NT Police and most NT Government departments, have direct links to the Northern Territory's shameful genocidal past. The "nigger hunts" that were still occurring up until the 1940's. The genocide continues.

In the Northern Territory 53% of Aboriginal men do not live beyond the age of 50. A fast food, alcohol lifestyle as a powerless minority in their own country, encroaching upon a healthy bush tucker diet and traditional worldview. We are still poisoning Aboriginal people and hiding (from international censure) their corpses.

As John Pilger states, "The theft and co-option of Aboriginal humanity, dignity and culture is more subtle now, but the ignorance and prejudice behind it remain granite-hard."

Calls to rob and trash the homes of mandatory sentencing opponents have been published in the "populist" NT News, by supposedly outraged "victims of crime". This concern for Darwin's suburban security (the NT's Capital city) ignores the reality that most mandatory sentencing involves remote (Aboriginal) communities. Strongholds where resistance to European invasion still remains.

The NT Police role has more to do with facilitating unwelcome and intrusive white interests in these remote regions than "protecting and serving" Aboriginal people.

A complementary factor in the traditional Australian racism/secrecy mix is militarism. The swing to the Right in Australia has seen the construction of a fleet of submarines, the purchase of hi-tech American helicopters with silly macho names and the nationalistic glorification of Australia as a military power. Military spending has soared and a hundred billion dollar package has recently been requested on top of Australia's 'normal' annual military budget (8-13 Billion dollars).

The recently enacted Goods and Services Tax (GST) deserves the more appropiate name of the Guns and Submarines Tax. This militarism flies in the face of reality. The Cold War is over and our so-called regional threat Indonesia, is an economic basket case. Australian troops and business interests have recently occupied East Timor. A traditional buffer between Australia and the "Yellow Peril."

The glorification of Australia's role in Vietnam and East Timor is a national delusion necessary to maintain a host of other national delusions. In Australia cheering crowds waved Australian flags as the "Diggers" returned home from their non-battles in East Timor. The story of the courage of the Fretlin fighters who kept the Indonesian Army (ABRI) bottled up in Dili for ten years and then waged a guerilla war with their enemies captured weapons for another fourteen years in the countryside, is not for public consumption in Australia.

The training of Indonesian troops by Australia and our prompting and recognition of Indonesia's invasion of East Timor are similarly non-palatable facts.

While Northern Territory businesses enrich themselves at the expense of the indigenous people in East Timor (they claim to have snared 40% of the available foreign business contracts in East Timor) the NT Government continues to persecute Australian activists who protested against the invasion of East Timor.

The Australian and NT Government's involvement in the invasion of East Timor is historical fact. The unique "memorandum of understanding" between the NT Government and the Indonesian military dictatorship of Suharto - responsible for the torture, rape and mass murder of the East Timorese - should explain PARIAH's no-compromise policy with the NT Country Liberal Party.

Essentially Australia gave Indonesia the go ahead to invade East Timor as the Portuguese colonial power withdrew, because an Independent East Timor would not have been as favourable a proposition in exploiting the huge reserves of oil and gas under the Timor Sea. Recent articles in Australian newspapers about the profits and jobs to be created by exploiting these oil and gas fields do not even mention the East Timorese. Some honesty in Australian journalism?

An Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) delegation invited to celebrate May Day 2000 in Dili (East Timor) recognized, "the issues of common ground ...Particularily the fight for self determination." Australia's Indigenous people are not fooled by nationalistic propaganda that claims the East Timorese were 'liberated' by Australian troops.

The NT Greens a minor political party, probably best explained Australia's role in the genocide of the East Timorese - It's because they're "poor and black."

Race is a major determinant in local and Federal elections. An Aboriginal spokesperson described this as the "race card" shuffled and dealt from the stacked deck of duopoly. The Liberal Party (Conservative) and the Labor Party (Conservative) have recently enacted (in the bipartisan spirit that ensures healthy pay rises to politicians) legislation that will hinder the formation of new (and the maintenance of existing) minor political parties in Australia, such as the aforementioned NT Greens.

Democracy has always been a threat to Australian business interests and their puppet governments, both locally and overseas. The use of racism to divide and distract the people of Australia and a two party system (that regularly accuse each other of policy theft) has had enormous success in curtailing that threat. This is hardly a stratagem unique to Australia.

To point out to the Australian people that they are inordinately wealthy (were that wealth divided equitably) and that massive and needless military spending is more likely to lead to regional instability than to peace, has become an extremist position in Australia. To ask for justice for our indigenous people is to invite mockery and hatred.

Home-invasions, destruction of property and theft against PARIAH members, are simply not considered illegal acts in the NT. They are encouraged by the NT Police and ignored by the largely duopolist (Packer and Murdoch) media. The law, used so relentlessly against PARIAH members offers us no protection at all.

In 1995 everything I owned was stolen from my home on the Cox Peninsula. Four Belyuen (Aboriginal) men were with me the morning after the thieves first struck. We caught them red-handed loading my roof onto a hire-truck. These people were not simply robbing me - they were moving me off the Kenbi Claim which most whites here still refuse to concede is Aboriginal land. One of the thieves threatened to "...Blow my fucking head off!" with a 9mm automatic pistol. I was punching one of his accomplices at the time.

For three months prior to a trial in the NT Supreme Court, myself and a Canadian tourist who was living with me, suffered death threats and continual intimidation. The local loobies* who did this, were obviously involved in the armed eviction. The NT Police who were aware of this intimidation (there were about 80 adults in the town) did nothing - in fact they probably organized this intimidatory treatment against their Prosecution witness.

The NT Police Prosecutor for this trial (the ill-named Mr. Noble) refused to charge the thieves with theft of all my belongings or firearms offenses. The vigilante who pointed a gun at my head was only charged with assault (his armed accomplice was not charged at all) and the attempted theft of my roof.

To cut a very long and very painful story short ...Despite his owning a 9mm automatic pistol ...Despite (or because) of the testimony of the four Aboriginal witnesses ...Despite his hiring the truck under his own name for the two days my home was robbed ...He was acquitted and his pistol returned to him. None of my property which included two water tanks, was ever returned.

The NT Police were determined to see that justice was not done. They did not call a witness who had sold these armed vigilantes ammunition on the way to my home (the vigilantes claimed there were no guns) and NT Police deleted sections of the gunman's 'tape of interview' that proved his guilt. The Police Prosecutor (and Judge) allowed the Defense to lead and confuse the Aboriginal witnesses.

The Judge treated me as the criminal. The jury were Territorians. Racist and ignorant loobies who considered a dread-locked, 'nigger-loving', "alternate lifestyler" (NT Police description) even seeking justice - to be a personal affront.

Until the influx of the Jabiluka uranium protester's from the Eastern States in 1998, a person with dreadlocks and a 'vocal' disdain of white supremacism was a rarity in the NT. The 'hippy movement' in Darwin was one of the first casualties of Cyclone Tracy in the '70's, as the Australian military occupied a devastated Darwin and NT Police turned a blind eye to the attacks on hippy encampments, by anal retentive locals.

After the 'trial' the Sheriff of the NT Supreme Court told me, "You'd better move." I did not.

The most recent attack on our home November 2000 in which a water tank was stolen and a wall smashed apart, was in response (according to NT Police Constable Wayne Curyar in charge of the 'investigation') to a poster that accused the militarist/uniform clique on the Cox Peninsula of "pissing on the graves of the ANZACs." Constable Curyar believes we got what we deserved.

Despite this professionally objective analysis, I am still unable to see a link between the lies, the Hitlerian racism, the home-invasions (in one of these attacks a PARIAH member's bed was urinated on) and the total disregard for the law by this dishonourable clique, with the supposedly heroic and honourable tradition of the Australian New Zealand Army Corp. (ANZAC) To respect one is to insult the other.

It was pretty obvious to us which particular ex-Vietnam veteran (victim?) was responsible for this political reprisal and I emailed my accusation to the NT Police and mentioned that we had a witness. So it was no surprise when Constable Curyar rang and informed us that the person I had accused, had taken the water tank, but claimed I owed him money for it. A water tank paid for, two and a half years (and dozens of other cash transactions) ago. The NT Police claimed there were no grounds to charge him. (Sudden rush of deja vu.)

When I demanded he at least be charged for Criminal Damage and Home Invasion, Constable Curyar hung up and 45 minutes later, three armed Police Officers were at PARIAH's Darwin base to arrest me for an outstanding fine. This regarding a political action against Australia's involvement in the genocide of the East Timorese. I refused to pay a fine to a government that condoned this genocide.

Anticipating such bastardry from the NT Police, I was unavailable for arrest, imprisonment and possible death in custody. I am not concerned for my personal safety (even my bitterest critics would concede that) but I am concerned, that brain damage or death might impede my giving evidence against the NT Commissioner of Police in July 2001. Three of the people involved in PARIAH's complaint against the NT Commissioner of Police, are ex-NT Prison Officers.

A long running inquiry into "black deaths in custody ended with not one Australian Police or Prison Officer being found culpable. A statistically improbable result. The deaths in custody continue. Paradoxically no-one cares about prisoners in this convict founded society. The NT Government's conspiracy with NT Police and Prison Officers to escape legal examination and penalties in the PARIAH complaints, has Australia-wide implications.

Constable Curyar and the coward who stole my property and smashed up our home, both feature in my complaint against the NT Police, as does the Klandorah Town Clerk, 'Watto' - whose inability to challenge our public allegations legally, led to this gutless reprisal. This is democracy. This is law and order in the Northern Territory of Australia.

"The beginning of the cause of deaths in custody does not occur within the confines of police and prison cells or in the minds of the victims. Initially it starts in the minds of those who allow it to happen."
Elder Dr. Jack Davis - AO, MBE

PARIAH points out in our web site, that we use grass roots tactics and the responses to them, to illustrate the societal reality of racism in Australia. Despite our current lack of success in the NT Courts, it is still our only means to have our views and evidence incorporated into the Public Record. The responses to our campaign have exposed widespread institutionalized racism and political corruption in the NT. When we complained of political discrimination and victimization (for good reason) to the NT Anti-Discrimination Commission it was only to see the Commissioner replaced midway through the complaint process and a Public Hearing canceled two days before it was due to begin, by her replacement.

Our complaints which expose the NT Country Liberal Party Government as racist criminals have all been rejected. The new Commissioner Tom Stodulka (ex-Navy) was appointed by the NT Chief Minister and NT Attorney General, Denis Burke (ex-Army). Prior to this appointment Tom worked in the NT Attorney General's office.

The former NT Anti-Discrimination Commissioner Dawn Lawrie (who came second in the Darwin Mayoral election in 2000) told me I was "being screwed.."

In the year 2000, PARIAH members made about two dozen court appearances related (in one way or another) to our political views. None of our legal arguments have been allowed to be presented. Under the NT Anti-Discrimination Act any detriment that is caused because of a complaint of political discrimination is a breach of Section 23 - victimization.

The following is a fraction (for the purposes of brevity) of what PARIAH members have been through, since lodging a Political Discrimination complaint against the Cox Peninsula Community Government Council (CPCGC) in 1998.

This complaint was lodged due to having obscenities bellowed at me when I asked a question about racism at a CPCG meeting and was prevented from speaking. According to the thirty odd loobies at the meeting, no such incident occurred. A surreptitious tape-recording of a (now hostile) witness, proves they are lying. Such evidence is admissable under the Act, but was simply ignored by the CLP Government's new ADC Commissioner. The many pages of testimony by the Respondents are totally contradictory. It is an offense to lie to the Commission. Section 110(c).

Just a few of the complaints of Political victimization rejected by the NT Anti- Discrimination Commission.

1. The Australian Communications Authority accused us of being on their land and wanted us to leave. The detriment is obvious. "Watto" the Town Clerk of the CPCGC approached the ACA, a Federal body to do this. So eager to solve their "political problem" and so incompetent are these people, they were unaware their boundary halted 30 meters from our home. All these facts are documented. Rejected.

2. To overcome this bungled attempt at political persecution the Dept. Land Planning and Environment used four armed NT Police to publicly serve me a Trespass Notice, six weeks later. We were given 24 hours to leave my home (of at that time) seven years or be imprisoned. Once again the detriment is obvious.

An inquiry to the NT Ombudsman (a supposedly impartial Government complaints Department, that used to employ ADC Commissioner Tom Stodulka) revealed this eviction was due to an "anonymous" 'phonecall that stated we were "annoying local residents." You can imagine the effect this political persecution was having on anyone who supported us. Rejected.

The day after Insult Day 1999 (formerly known as Australia Day) - A day when we celebrate in our callous fashion the invasion of Australia by Europeans, NT Police arrested and imprisoned us. Myself for Trespass and Fiona (PARIAH's Archivist) for allegedly putting up posters that expressed disgust at this insensitive white supremacist celebration. Obviously another political reprisal.

The complaint against Fiona was laid by the CPCGC Town Clerk who didn't actually see her put up a poster. When the next Australia Day rolled around in (2000) I was again visited and charged by NT Police. Another blatant political reprisal in response to PARIAH's "Racists Love Australia Day" posters.

Ten years ago Australia Day was just another public holiday. Now that Australia has shifted massively to the Right, it has become an embarrassingly nationalistic celebration, expressing patriotic pride in a country that has little right to self-glorification. The 'family values' drivel, of a Federal government that refuse to apologize for the destruction of Aboriginal family units, (the Stolen Generations) is a nostalgic return - for an aging population - to the good old days of post World War 2 Australia.

3. Despite my being the Deputy Captain and Public Officer of the local Bushfire Brigade, a water tax was enacted just for PARIAH members by the CPCGC. This new tax for "nonresidents" singled us out and was proposed the same day,
(3-12-1998) the Trespass Notice was served. We already paid for water use and as the water comes from an Aboriginal sacred site we refused to pay a tax to the racist Council persecuting us. To cut off our water is also why our water tank was stolen. Rejected.

Any evidence from preceding complaints, becomes substantive evidence for the next complaint. So the chance of rejection should diminish as new complaints arise. Many complaints accepted by the Northern Territory ADC rely on hearsay and probabilities. It is not a "legalistic" process.

Our complaints are heavily documented, as we have an entire Government apparatus opposing us. No complaints accepted by the NT ADC (I have read most of them) compare evidentially or logically to ours. This is due to the obviousness and volume of our evidence of political persecution, not a claim to legal brilliance.

4. The CPCG Council then decided that the Bushfire Brigade would no longer be able to meet at the Council office, because of my membership. A Council employee even placed an Open Letter on the town Notice Board underlining that point, in response to an Open Letter authorized by the Captain of the Brigade complaining of my victimization by the Council. Rejected.

5. In an unsurprising about-face, eight days later the Bushfire Brigade was attempting to expel me due to pressure from the NT Government. The charge was bringing the Brigade into disrepute. The charge failed, because when I asked how I was bringing the Bushfire Brigade into disrepute? No-one could answer me.

A second meeting succeeded in expelling me, despite my pointing out - as Public Officer - that having the expulsion order typed up as "unanimous" before the meeting to vote on my expulsion, was undemocratic and inaccurate. I did not vote to expel me. The Bush Fire Council refused to answer any letters prior to and after my illegal expulsion despite my being the legal officer (Public Officer) for the Brigade. Rejected.

Latham the Captain of the Brigade, is the person who recently stole my water tank and smashed my home apart. After supporting PARIAH for nearly two years, he is desperate to distance himself from his previous involvement. His attempt to withdraw "solemnly sworn" statements that support PARIAH (and contradict the testimony of his fellow loobies) reveals this desperation and is a public admission that he is liar. The man is now a witness for the Respondents.

The perversion of justice that sees the 'turning' of witnesses, is a feature of all our complaints and is why the NT Police do not want this person charged and available for cross-examination. Summary Prosecutions and the NT Police Professional Responsibilities Division (Internal Affairs) agree with PARIAH, that Latham should be charged.

In the NT the Bush Fire Council and the NT Police come under the same political portfolio.

Obviously the complaints are much more detailed, but even these cursory facts must be seen to satisfy the requirements of Victimization, Section 23 given the cumulative weight of such evidence.

The basis of our appeal - regarding the latest rejection by the ADC of a complaint against the NT Police - is that the Anti-Discrimination Commission has bowed to political pressure. Wish us luck.

If you believe these injustices are minor - remember that a Government perverting justice in the name of racism, is a major act of criminal conspiracy.

The NT Anti-Discrimination Commission is seen to have allowed (if not encouraged) political persecution against Complainants, under their own Act.

The Northern Territory Country Liberal Party is racist and corrupt.

Every contact we had with the Mandorah township was severed, by simply treating us as subhuman, people without human rights. I can not begin to explain the "fear and loathing" our defense of Aboriginal people and our lack of respect for liars and hypocrites has created. That people are lying and perverting the law they use against us at every opportunity, with the protection and cooperation of the NT Government, demonstrates how racism corrupts a democracy.

A friend warned me recently, that I would be killed if I returned to my home on the Cox Peninsula. People there are 'blaming' PARIAH's campaign for the Aboriginal land rights victory. That is very flattering, but please, shoot me because you are a desperate pack of liars and cowards who can't even answer PARIAH's allegations of racism, not because of some beery fantasy.

For the record, the NT Government which wasted $20,000,000 fighting the Kenbi claim, has never beaten a land claim in the NT and they have contested every single one. Their policy has always been to make it as difficult as possible for the Aboriginal people and to create as much hatred and discord as they possibly can along the way. It is the basis of their electoral strategy and the gullible loobies that support the NT Country Liberal Party pay for it.

The local Aboriginal people told us two years ago to leave the Kenbi claim to them, but to continue to tell the truth about racism in the NT. So we did and we do. We live on their land and we respect their wishes. We are family.

*Loobies (archaic English) means country bumpkins. It's similarity to loonies and loopy, demands a resurgence of this neglected term.

*Pariah means social outcast.

Update: The NT CLP Government intend to challenge the Kenbi Claim results.

Update: NT Police eventually arrested and imprisoned me, protesting the perversion of law and abuse of office - used against PARIAH members - outside the NT Magistrate's Court. Watto and Latham have yet to be charged for theft and Criminal Damage at my home on the Cox Peninsula.

The same day I was arrested, NT Police threatened to charge me with Criminal Damage, regarding pasting PARIAH posters to a concrete boundary marker in 1999. NT Police should put up or shut up.