The strategy of bussing people around is not new. It was used effectively during the Swan Brewery protest in Perth where Aboriginal dissidents were ferried in from Wiluna to speak against local Nyoongar Elders who were trying to protect their spiritual heritage from development. The Wiluna people were not related to the Swan River Nyoongars but this didn't matter to the politicians.
Darwin - or Robertson Barracks - isn't exactly seen as a comfort post. One comment on a military weblog reckoned that while the Northern Territory might be a great place to conduct large-scale training exercises most of the troops won't be based at or near Darwin but at Bradshaw an awful long way from Darwin. One commentator described Bradshaw as a "shitty place to be posted".
Professor Karen Edyvane: "With the inaccurate, misinformed and highly partisan, 'anti-Marine Park' views of the Territory's only daily newspaper, the NT News, Territorians are neither being informed of the basic scientific facts, nor the overwhelming scientific consensus and support for Marine Parks - including 'no-take' Marine Sanctuaries. The NT News has instead, engaged in gross misinformation, inflammatory and partisan anti-Marine Park media coverage and editorial commentary."
UPDATED - Now with added Gerry Wood! That's not all! Just next to this rubbish dump there is an open sewerage pond where the raw sewage is pumped out straight of the houses. It is just very rough and ready - a hole in the ground surrounded by a chain-mesh fence. Pure raw sewage. The tip is about 2 or 3 minutes drive from the community. Kids walk back and forth. Dogs can get into the sewage ponds and then they go back to the community. It is a disgrace.
I indicated by local sign language that I would stay where I was and that he should pass me, a signal involving a closed fist and one or two up and down movements of the wrist 'I'm staying here'. I should have realised of course that this signal wouldn't work cross-culturally and that only when I saw the police officer drive up to my window and start abusing me did I realise that this local signal had no currency with the constabulary. He protested I was being offensive and in between the yelling I attempted to somehow explain the intricacies of Bininj sign language. I realised it was a lost cause. It still is.
AMSANT noted in its submission that it: "...note[d] that the many threats to environmental and public health that have been largely eliminated in the rest of the nation over the past century still blight many of our communities: urban, regional and remote. To this extent, the capacity of comprehensive primary health care to meet the needs of Aboriginal Territorians—to Close the Gap—will continue to be frustrated in environments in which fundamental public health protections are not available or unmet." AMSANT was concerned at the parlous state of environmental health of many of the communities that its members serve, where: "Poor environmental health conditions in remote communities and town camps include inadequate sanitation, water supply, rubbish disposal and grossly overcrowded housing. Basic infrastructure in many remote communities is either absent, inadequate and/or poorly maintained."
This brings us back to the Notice at the Nyirripi Store and begs the following question. Has anyone bothered to ask the locals if they want the Police to shoot their dogs? No? I thought not.
Pornography Drop-off Point. "This one is at the airstrip and is one of a pair. The other one is at the entrance to Yuendumu near the patronising “Look for People” sign. We inspect the bins daily. So far nothing has been placed in them. Anything we recover from the bins, we will incinerate."
Pastoralism in the Northern Territory is really a form of strip mining. The pastoralists are mining some of the soil nutrient elements (chemicals) out of the grasses and other leaves and exporting them in live cattle. This is happening to some of the poorest soils and ecosystems in Australia. The operation is being subsidised by the government to a considerable extent. Cattle are little more than parasitic grit in the machinery of our ecosystem. How could it be otherwise? How could the pastoral industry possibly be ecologically sustainable in the Northern Territory?
Friends. We meet here, your country. We meet here, on Australian soil, our country. And we come together in this place, at this time, to celebrate a moment uniquely yours, uniquely Australian. We celebrate an agreement between the traditional owners of this land and a mining giant.
