General Introduction

General introduction. The populations of remote indigenous communities in the Northern Territory are unique. They have the highest proportions of first speakers of indigenous languages in the country. They are the closest to the traditional culture and way of life of almost any others in Australia, on a par with those in the most remote communities of South Australia and Western Australia. They have the highest rates of some life-threatening chronic illnesses, not only in the country, but in some notable cases, in the world. They have the highest rates of unemployment, road fatalities, interpersonal violence, violence against women, child sexual abuse, youth suicide, substance abuse, in the country. They have the lowest levels of school attendance, educational achievement, and facility with English. Since the priority goal of the schools has been the preservation of indigenous culture and language several generations of children have gone through them without being taught to speak, let alone read and write, the national language. They are also mostly functionally innumerate. Their world view comes out of survival for tens of millennia in very small scale, kin based, hunter gatherer societies. The traditional life is not very far in the past. There are those still alive who can clearly remember seeing a European for the first time. Many of those now in middle age are only one generation removed from that experience. The last family to come out of the desert did so as recently as 1984. None of this is an indication of lack of intelligence. Survival in one of the world’s harshest environments, in the case of the desert people, with one of the world’s simplest technologies required a life-long accumulation of complex and exquisitely detailed knowledge and the application of an incredibly high level of skill. They are amongst the most linguistically talented people in the world. And yet the schools have still failed to teach them the language needed to effectively communicate with the rest of the world. English is not only our national language but also a dominant world language. They are in a state of crisis and they lack the educational tools to make sense of the outside world. They do not have a tradition of democratic representation. Aboriginal Australians were granted the right to vote in Commonwealth elections in 1962. They were not legally compelled to vote until 1983. This coupled with ignorance of the national law and, for many a profound disinterest since the priority has to be day to day survival, has led to a disturbingly high proportion of those obliged to enroll to vote not doing so. During elections up to 50% of those enrolled do not vote. 1 There is a wide spread ignorance of the nature of the traditional Aboriginal culture, world view and languages among the wider population of Australians. Very few of those engaging with these communities have been trained to do so effectively. Too many are driven by the desire to avoid offence rather than to get a difficult and complex job done effectively. There are those in the world of business, politics and administration who are very willing to take advantage themselves of the lack of educational achievement and facility with English that disadvantages the people in these communities. Bess Nungarrayi Price was born and raised at Yuendumu and Warlpiri is her first language. She speaks three other Aboriginal languages as well. She has spent her life living in and working with the people in remote communities in the Centre, Top End and the Kimberley. Almost all of her family lives in such communities or in town camps. Bess Nungarrayi was appointed to chair the first, and only, Indigenous Affairs Advisory Council for the NT government. She was elected to the NT parliament in 2012, until the election of 2016, and served for a while as the only woman in the NT cabinet in the nation’s first government to be led by an indigenous Australian. She holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Aboriginal Community Management and Development. David Price holds an MLitt in Linguistics as well as qualifications in Education and Special Education. He has worked as a teacher in remote communities in the Centre, Top End and Kimberley for over seven years and with remote communities for another fifteen years with the APS and NTPS. We have now experienced firsthand, and up close, two elections for the Northern Territory parliament and two for the Commonwealth parliament in those communities. Bess Nungarrayi was a candidate in the two NT elections. Our daughter Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, was a candidate in the 2019 Commonwealth election. The following relates directly to the 2019 Commonwealth election but we have witnessed the kind of behaviour described in the other elections as well. In the remote Northern Territory it has been a problem for as long as we can remember. 2 Concerns Problems with RAMP (Remote Area Mobile Polling) Labor supporters put up hundreds of core flutes posters on roads throughout the NT by tech screwing them to trees. This is an illegal practice. They were removed by local councils when they were alerted but many stayed up in remote areas. In remote polling booths across the NT Labor supporters were seen handing out How to Votes and wearing campaign messages and symbols on their clothing within restricted areas. In several communities, from one end of the NT to the other, paid Labor workers were seen to place themselves in a position where they could influence voting with the use of the local language within the restricted zones and within the booths themselves. At Ali Curung (Alekerange) a paid member of the NTG, a member of the staff of the local Labor MLA was seen to be handing out HTV’s. This occurred elsewhere in Arnhem Land as well. Labor workers speaking the local language could also intimidate voters, especially women, if they chose to do so, while AEC staff had no idea of what was being communicated in the local language. At Milingimbi voters were being told to vote for Labor, in the local dialect of Yolngu Matha, over community loud speakers that could be clearly heard within the polling booth itself. Also, at Milingimbi a European member of the Labor team handed out How To Votes within the exclusion Zone. His behaviour and body language was deliberately aggressive and intimidating. He behaved this way towards Bess Nungarrayi and Jacinta Nampijinpa following them around in the process and when asked not to he replied ‘I’ll stand where I like’. He acted that way towards voters as well, especially Aboriginal women. He was offered free sunglasses by an Air North employee. He refused them telling her that he preferred to stare people in the eyes. This is incredibly aggressive and intimidating behaviour in any culture but is deeply offensive in traditional Aboriginal culture in particular. He moved out of the restricted zone when asked to by AEC staff after a complaint had been made. He moved back in when not being watched and finally complied only when he realised he was being filmed. Senator Marlarndirri MacArthy had to instruct him to move away from Bess Nungarrayi and Jacinta Nampijinpa only after the women directly complained to her even though she’d witnessed it from the start. 3 In other booths, too, large, white males deliberately adopted aggressive poses to intimidate Aboriginal voters, particularly Aboriginal women . We have witnessed this behaviour often. Restricted areas were often ill defined. Rather than being delineated by accurate measurement they were usually established through negotiations between the AEC staff and the party teams at each booth. Because of the siting of buildings, parking areas, fences and trees, the restricted zone at Haasts Bluff Community (Ikuntji) was particularly irregular which made it extremely difficult for the CLP team of two to adequately cover all approaches to the booth without inadvertently entering the zone. Retired politician Alison Anderson working for Labor Alison Anderson has had a chequered political career. She entered the NT parliament as a Labor MLA. She resigned from the government and the party accusing both of racism. She then became independent. In a subsequent election she was preselected to stand for the CLP, on the seat, then resigned from that government and party, accusing both of racism, and once again became independent. She then briefly joined the PUP before telling the world that it was ‘a national disgrace’. Since then she has worked for the ALP during the 2016 NT election and the 2019 Commonwealth election. In the 2019 election Alison Anderson was paid to work for the Labor campaign. She admitted this herself to David Price. At Laramba she was acting as scrutineer. The AEC staff gave scrutineers AEC staff bibs to wear. David Price scrutineered for the CLP. He brought to the booth captain’s attention the fact that scrutineers were not AEC staff and should not be wearing their staff bibs. Alison Anderson continued to wear their bib. As an ex-MLA and Minister of the Crown she should have been aware that this behaviour was not appropriate. She sat within the restricted zone socializing with and speaking to every voter entering the booth in their own language that none of the AEC staff could understand. She sat in a position where she could see what was happening in the booth itself. She called an ALP worker, wearing their t shirt, to come into the restricted zone to hand out HTV’s. During the 2016 NT election the journalist for the Australian, Amos Aikman, rang Bess Nungarrayi to tell her that Anderson had repeated an outrageously defamatory and obscene allegation to him concerning the public behaviour of Bess Nungarrayi who was a CLP candidate in that election.

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