The Prime Minister and his Protector of Aborigines continue to treat the residents of remote Indigenous communities as political pawns. It's no surprise then that they cop a bit of curry in the bush.
Word has it that federal Minister for Indigenous Affairs Mal Brough was made to feel more than a little uncomfortable at Mutitjulu recently when he passed through town to open a new police station.
Some accounts suggest that Brough was rattled by an animated group of locals who gave him a well-earned burst for his loose language a while back about “pedophile rings” operating in remote communities.
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“You are the minister for racism, the minister for neglect ... You have attacked our men and our people, you are telling lies,” local Aboriginal man Vincent Forrester is reported to have said.
No surprises thus far, except that Brough was apparently taken aback by the warmth of the welcome.
I wonder at the quality of the reconnaissance that the ex-army officer carried out, prior to embarking on his Mutitjulu mission. Given that he's made an art form out of denigrating remote communities - and Mutitjulu in particular - ever since he took over the portfolio, surely he should have been expecting a hostile reception.
Brough visits a broad range of remote communities, but all the evidence suggests that he arrives with predetermined answers rather than thoughtful questions.
As Frank Hardy's character Billy Borker was wont to say: “There are none so blind as those that will not see”.
The minister must realise that if he is going to demonise remote communities at every opportunity he must expect some backlash.
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Provision of infrastructure in these far-flung locations is crucial, but Indigenous communities are entitled to have a say in the “what” and the “how” and the “when”.
The people who live in these places are not cardboard cut-outs. Governments must disabuse themselves of the notion that blackfellas will be grateful for crumbs from the table.
Indigenous Australians want a fair go - not presents of beads, mirrors or police stations.
They want to determine for themselves how they will live. And they want to protect and nurture a culture which has served them well for more than 40,000 years.
The outpouring of anger at Mutitjulu reflects widespread disappointment at the federal government's manipulative approach to the problems of remote communities.
Mutitjulu has been under sustained attack from the Howard Government for some months now.
The community will go to court this week to challenge the government's decision to impose a Perth-based administrator on them.
Last week the federal police arrived at Mutitjulu with search warrants, and turned over the home and office of Dorethea Randall, the community's acting chief executive office, seizing her computer hard-drive.
An unusually coy Minister Brough had no comment to make about what he has described as “operational police matters”.
Perhaps then, the Attorney General could take a break from offering bodgy legal advice on the Noongar native title decision and explain why it was necessary to raid Mutitjulu just before the community goes to court.
If Brough's name is mud in Mutitjulu, the good citizens of Wadeye are also experiencing a growing reluctance to roll out the welcome mat.
The emaciated body of the Wadeye COAG trial has been cryogenically frozen, so that the government doesn't have to admit that the patient has died - and risk a politically damaging public funeral.
They certainly wouldn't want a coroner's report, given the demonstrated capacity of these public officials to report precisely and unflinchingly on the circumstances that surround untimely deaths.
The courage demonstrated by Queensland's Deputy State Coroner, Christine Clements, in handing down her findings on the Palm Island death-in-custody was a high-water mark in Indigenous justice.
But Mutitjulu and Wadeye are not the only places where the minister is likely to meet with hostility.
Brough can expect to be abused in Areyonga, blasted in Beswick and castigated in Camooweal. They'll jeer in Jigalong, frown in Framlingham, and heckle in Hermannsburg.
Aboriginal people living in the bush are not the same as the whitefellas that cling to the eastern seaboard of this country. But they too have hopes, fears and expectations.
They are not “better” or “worse” than the residents of Sydney or Melbourne - just different. And every bit as real.