When I participated in the Warrandyte by-election, I was often asked by local residents about their stance on the “Aboriginal Voice” referendum. My standard answer at that time was that I was personally inclined to support the referendum, but I was still listening to the views of those who supported and those who opposed the referendum, and I had not yet made a final decision.
Why do I have such a stance? First of all, I recognize that the Aborigines, who have been living in Australia for 60,000 years, have not been treated reasonably since the British landed in Australia in 1788. Therefore, it is reasonable to recognize their role and place in history in the constitution and to give recognition to their mission in this land in this country. However, I am not sure how much of a change the referendum today will bring to Australia as a nation, and what the Australian community will have to pay for, as neither the supporters nor the opponents have elaborated.
When the British landed in Australia, it was estimated that there were nearly one million Aborigines at that time, and the number of British colonizers was far less than that of the Aborigines. The British colonialists did not use force on a large scale to exterminate the Aborigines and “take” the land. They just did not consider the Aborigines as “civilized” human beings and turned a blind eye to them and drove them away from the colonial cities. There were occasional conflicts between the colonists and the Aborigines in different states, and the Aborigines died in greater numbers, but there was no genocide, so it can be said that the British colonists were more “civilized” than the ancient conquerors in human history, such as the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Mongols, etc. Of course, this was also due to the fact that Australia had a large land area, and that the Aborigines were not “civilized”.
Of course, this was also because Australia was a vast land, and the British simply did not have the ability or the need to conquer this land by force. The Aborigines came into contact with the colonizers and influenced each other to maintain their own culture, and there were also the next generation through marriages. Each state had its own officials to deal with Aboriginal issues.
When the Commonwealth of Australia was established in 1901, the Aborigines were not listed as nationals of the Commonwealth of Australia in the constitution, so it can be said that the Commonwealth government did not have any responsibility for the Aborigines. When the Aborigines broke the laws of Australia and the states, they were subject to the same penalties as other people, but they were not given any welfare benefits, which was obviously inhumane and unfair. It was not until 1967 that the Commonwealth government put forward a referendum to recognize the Aborigines as part of Australia, and it was only then that the Australian government had the constitutional right to formulate responsibilities to improve the lives of the Aborigines in Australia.
However, from the middle of the 19th century to 1967, the state and federal governments implemented policies that governed the Aborigines, which were euphemistically called the integration of the Aborigines as Australians, but in fact, were racial policies that did not respect the Aborigines’ culture. For example, the Stolen Generation policy, which has a history of more than 100 years, was an inhumane policy that forced Aboriginal children to be taken away from their parents and raised by white people after birth and caused many Aboriginal people to have developmental problems and mental illnesses, but the government at the time regarded this as a “reasonable and justifiable” policy. The government’s view at the time was that it was the best way to take care of these aboriginal children by allowing them to enter the civilized life of modern society directly. It was not known that civilization could not be mechanically imposed on a person, and many Aborigines were not accepted as full human beings because they could not become white people like their caretakers and accept their way of life. Without their own history, without their own culture, without their own past, without their own identity, the development of these people became incomplete, causing great harm.
Later on, the Australian society emphasized the policy against racial discrimination, and more people were concerned about the discrimination against the Aborigines because they were not colonized by the British, and more people began to propose the right to preserve the Aborigines’ culture and way of life. 1988 was the bicentennial of the British colonization, and Prime Minister Hawke proposed to sign a treaty to reach a reconciliation with the Aborigines, but in the end, the proposal was not carried out. However, the fight for Aboriginal status in Australia has been a social movement for the past 30 to 40 years.
In 2017, a meeting of more than 300 Aboriginal representatives was held at the Big Red Rock in Uluru, at which the Uluru Declaration was finalized, demanding a response from the Australian government. After his election victory last year, Prime Minister Albanese immediately stated that he would fulfil the demands of the Uluru Declaration. The current referendum is to realize this declaration constitutionally.
Whether the Uluru Declaration is only the wish of a minority of Aboriginal representatives, or whether it will be accepted by Australians and enshrined in the constitution, is the question that this referendum will address. Therefore, before the referendum on October 14th, let’s read this Uluru Declaration and understand the demands of the Aboriginal representatives, and then we will talk about the current controversy next time.
Raymond Chow
Uluru statement from the heart
We, gathered at the 2017 National Constitutional Convention, coming from all points of the southern sky, make this statement from the heart:
Our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander tribes were the first sovereign Nations of the Australian continent and its adjacent islands, and possessed it under our own laws and customs. This our ancestors did, according to the reckoning of our culture, from the Creation, according to the common law from ‘time immemorial’, and according to science more than 60,000 years ago.
This sovereignty is spiritual notion: the ancestral tie between the land, or ‘mother nature’, and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples w
ho were born therefrom, remain attached thereto, and must one day return thither to be united with our ancestors. This link is the basis of the ownership of the soil, or better, of sovereignty. It has never been ceded or extinguished, and co-exists with the sovereignty of the Crown.
How could it be otherwise? That peoples possessed a land for sixty millennia and this sacred link disappears from world history in merely the last two hundred years?
With substantive constitutional change and structural reform, we believe this ancient sovereignty can shine through as a fuller expression of Australia’s nationhood.
Proportionally, we are the most incarcerated people on the planet. We are not an innately criminal people. Our children are aliened from their families at unprecedented rates. This cannot be because we have no love for them. And our youth languish in detention in obscene numbers. They should be our hope for the future.
These dimensions of our crisis tell plainly the structural nature of our problem. This is the torment of our powerlessness.
We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take a rightful place in our own country. When we have power over our destiny our children will flourish. They will walk in two worlds and their culture will be a gift to their country.
We call for the establishment of a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution.
Makarrata is the culmination of our agenda: the coming together after a struggle. It captures our aspirations for a fair and truthful relationship with the people of Australia and a better future for our children based on justice and self-determination.
We seek a Makarrata Commission to supervise a process of agreement-making between governments and First Nations and truth-telling about our history.
In 1967 we were counted, in 2017 we seek to be heard. We leave base camp and start our trek across this vast country. We invite you to walk with us in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.