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Indigenous dreaming of a new era

By Stephen Hagan - posted Monday, 3 December 2007


So what are the issues and what type of representation do we want?

As I’ve travelled this vast country attending an assortment of Indigenous gatherings I’ve gained a broad perspective of what Indigenous people feel is required to address the current imbalance in both the representation and service delivery for their respective communities.

I’ll preface my comments on ATSIC by saying the majority of past ATSIC representatives were honourable leaders who tried their best to deliver programs in a fair and equitable manner.

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Notwithstanding my observation many community members who spoke to me feel they personally contributed to the demise of ATSIC through their inability to speak out on the lack of accountability and transparency of their leaders. Most agree that they voted the usual suspects into public office hoping they would change their questionable habits, but as with past experience they were proven wrong again.

I was told the usual suspects seemed to have their priorities wrong. When they should have been working for their people from their office base or out in the field among them they chose instead to entertain their associates at the local pub or gambling venues - playing pokies or betting at the TAB. When not at these locations I was told the “so called” leaders were generally accruing travel allowance fees and fuel card expenses on unnecessary and irrelevant travel.

In other words many of the voters simply voted along family lines instead of for the best person from their community. Some felt they had an obligation to follow the family line, while others openly admitted to me that they were coerced or intimidated by standover merchants or smooth talkers living within their community to vote a certain way.

Many even suggested that some unscrupulous leaders personally rubber stamped Indigenous confirmation letters of non-Indigenous people so they in turn could be eligible to vote for them in the ATSIC elections. I told these people to take their complaints to the police but many said they wouldn’t because of their fear of repercussions on them and their families from the offenders who rule their communities with a heavy hand.

I recognise that many responsible voters cast their vote without fear or favour on a candidate they thought could best represent them and their community. But in the final analysis that vote regrettably didn’t deliver enough leaders of substance to positively influence major policy initiatives.

Scores of people I’ve met around the nation have questioned the suitability of some ATSIC regional councillors when assessing the allocation of funding for domestic violence programs when it was common knowledge in their community that these councillors were the perpetrators of violent and regular beatings of their partners.

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Others commented on the appropriateness of some of ATSIC regional councillors passing judgment on detailed business applications when many of them are compulsive gamblers or simply careless with money and who have difficulty paying regular household bills.

Most elected representatives have no experience of owning or managing a small business and therefore have limited practical knowledge to call on in forming their decision at the Regional Council budget deliberations.

And again similar comments have been passed onto me by community members who were aghast at regional councillors doing the job of assessing alcohol and drug programs when paradoxically some of them would be suitably qualified, as alcohol and drug dependent people, for entry into the programs in question.

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About the Author

Stephen Hagan is Editor of the National Indigenous Times, award winning author, film maker and 2006 NAIDOC Person of the Year.

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