PERTH INDYMEDIA – Tuesday, 19 September 2006:

The Western Australian Nyoongar people have successfully claimed native title over metropolitan Perth in a landmark court decision.

The indigenous owners of Perth WA and much of its surrounding area, have been granted traditional ownership of their lands by Perth Federal Court judge Justice Murray Wilcox.

A group of eighty Nyoongar people represented by the South-West Aboriginal Land and Sea Council (SWALSC), lodged the Single Noongar native title claim in the federal court in September 2003.

The decision makes them the first Aboriginal group to successfully claim Native Title over a capital city. Supporters say the decision is a long overdue recognition of the Nyoongar people’s identity.

Justice Wilcox says the determination will not affect freehold or leasehold land or people’s backyards.

However the state government rejects the Federal Court’s decision…

The Nyoongar claim is one of the Australia’s largest and covers 193,956 square kilometres, from Hopetoun in the south to north of Jurien Bay — an area three times the size of Tasmania. Federal Court judge Justice Murray Wilcox today said the Noongar people were the traditional owners of the whole claim area, excluding offshore islands.

In his findings, Justice Wilcox emphasised that “the vast majority” of private landholders in Perth would be unaffected by the determination, as native title did not affect freehold or most leasehold land.

“I have reached the conclusion that the Single Noongar applicants are correct in claiming that, in 1829, the laws and customs governing land throughout the whole claim area were those of a single community,” Justice Wilcox told the court.

Justice Wilcox ruled the Noongar people continue to have native title of more than 6000 square kilometres, covering Perth and its surrounds.

The ruling means Nyoongar people can now exercise native title rights over land where native title has not been extinguished by “legislative or executive acts” such as freehold land. He says they will be able to maintain and protect significant sites in the area, and hunt, fish and gather food. They will also be able to use the land to teach traditional laws and customs.

The ruling would also give Nyoongars rights to access and carry out traditional activities such as fishing, hunting and maintaining sacred sites. Justice Wilcox urged the West Australian Government to avoid “expensive and time-consuming” litigation over individual parcels of land and instead discuss native title matters with indigenous claimants.

Nyoongar spokesman Robert Isaacs says the ruling is an important step forward. “We’ll work in harmony with people, we’ll work in harmony like we’ve always done,” he said. “We’re a very placid people, we’re dignified in our approach to Aboriginal culture and our laws and our ways. That’s what it’s all about, give us an opportunity, give us a go.”

Aboriginal leader Noel Pearson described the court’s decision as “absolutely extraordinary”, saying it completed the native title trilogy of “Mabo, Wik, and now Nyoongar” and demonstrated that native title was no longer confined to Aborigines in remote Australia.

Greens Senator Rachel Siewert also welcomed the announcement. “The Nyoongar community has faced an uphill battle to maintain their law and culture in the face of European settlement,” she said. “It is a tribute to their strength and determination that they have survived policies that sought to remove their children, their language and their culture.”

“Nyoongar language and culture are strong and experiencing a renewed resurgence. Now with their native title claim recognised they are in a much stronger position to continue their role as custodians of this land,” said Senator Siewert.

More than 100 Noongar people and their supporters cheered and clapped as Justice Wilcox gave the ruling. The metropolitan area is part of a wider claim covering 200,000 square kilometres of the state’s south-west, including major centres such as Bunbury, Margaret River and Albany.

But only hours after the judgment was handed down, WA Treasurer and Deputy Premier Eric Ripper told parliament “the state government does not accept today’s ruling”. The state Government is considering an appeal – which has disappointed the claimants. Mr Ripper says the decision is inconsistent with rulings in the High Court.

“It is only by appealing these inconsistent Federal Court decisions that we can achieve the necessary clarity at law,” he said. “The State Government now has 21 days to consider its options, one of which is to appeal the decision.”

The Chief Executive of the South-west Land Council, Glen Kelly, says native title has already been defined as a “bundle of rights”. “It’s a right to hunt, a right to camp, and a right to fish, a right to take care of sites, a right to care for country, these sorts of things, the sort of access to land and undertaking what people generally, intuitively know what traditional activities are.”

Mr Kelly says members of the Noongar community would seek a role in the management of national parks or state forests. He says the Federal Court ruling should not have major implications.

“The judge said, look, this doesn’t affect everyone’s backyards. And he said that, I think, because we had some massive scare campaigns in the 80s and in the 90s in Western Australia, and the judge was very careful to say look, backyards are freehold land, and freehold title extinguishes Native Title. And, look, this has always been the case, since the Mabo decision,” said Mr Kelly.

Glen Kelly says the state response is “really disappointing… We are of the opinion that, in particular Mr Ripper, who’s the minister responsible for Native Title, has been receiving some poor advice …the judge very clearly stated he finds that Native Title exists except where it has been extinguished. And in a capital city and the areas surrounding a capital city, that there’s a large amount of extinguishment, and that in general life will go on as it currently is.”

Liberal Senator Alan Eggleston has described the Federal Court’s decision as “regrettable”. He says the release of land for housing could be affected and encourages any moves by the WA Government to lodge an appeal.

Eric Ripper said there had been too much disruption to Nyoongar society for it to have survived in any meaningful way, and therefore their native title claim was not valid. He said the ruling was totally “inconsistent” with the fundamental native title.

SWALSC chief executive Glen Kelly said he was “astonished” by Mr Ripper’s response. “I am absolutely shocked that he would react in such a way,” Mr Kelly said. “We have no idea why the state is so vociferously opposed to Noongar people.” He called on the WA government to now join the Nyoongar people in negotiating native title over the rest of the claim area, rather than continuing with litigation.

Between the 1870s and the 1940s the destruction of Nyoongar culture was almost complete through the enforced relocation of traditional landowners as required by government legislation.

Justice Wilcox warned that a determination of native title was “neither the pot of gold for the indigenous claimants nor the disaster for the remainder of the community that is sometimes painted”.

Aboriginal leader Noel Pearson said the ruling restored native rights to Aborigines who lived in the cities and southern regions of Australia. “The Yorta Yorta decision was a complete bastardisation of the Native Title Act and Mabo,” Mr Pearson said. “This decision brings native title absolutely back on track. Native title is not the preserve of the most traditional groups in northern and remote Australia, it is also the legal right of people in urban and southern Australia.”

The judge dismissed an application by the state Government to strike out the claim, and ordered them to pay court costs. Glen Kelly says the decision was a breakthrough for Nyoongar people, but would not lead to any royalty payments or claims over prominent Perth landmarks such as St Georges Terrace or Kings Park.

“Freehold title covers most of Perth and the southwest and extinguishes native title but in remaining lands we will be able to conduct traditional activities and maintain customs,” Mr Kelly said. “There is nothing to fear – this decision enables Nyoongar people and the state Government to begin talking to each other in a more constructive manner.”

The Nyoongar decision is in stark contrast to a Federal Court ruling in April that rejected a claim over the Darwin metropolitan area by the Larrakia people on the grounds that they could not prove a traditional connection to the area. Another native title claim over the Yulara township at Uluru in central Australia also failed.

The Perth Federal Court decision has dramatically increased the bargaining power of native title claimants and cleared the way for claims over other capital cities. Now that native title has been found to exist in Perth, the onus falls to the Government to prove where native title has been extinguished.

Native title lawyer Christine Lovitt, said there was no doubt that all freehold and most leasehold land would be unaffected by yesterday’s ruling. But without a compromise, the Government would have the massive burden of showing that native title had been extinguished on thousands of other parcels of land.

“It would be an absolute nightmare,” said Ms Lovitt. She warned that even with all the resources of the state Government, it could take years to resolve doubts about each parcel of land.”

The problem confronting the state Government has come about because the Federal Court dealt with the Nyoongar claim using a technique that has never before been successfully applied over a metropolitan area.

The court split the claim in two and dealt only with the threshold question of whether native title did, in fact, continue to exist in Perth.

—–

Kwodjungut nidja Wadjalla koorl ngalar Nyoongar balaba
Before this whiteman come our people they

kaaree wangkiny. Maarlukal iddiny balaba waangk – ngyne yung
spirit talk. In wild forest walking they talk – give me

yongka daartj ka ngyne yung noonaar walbrinniny. Nguluk kudidjiny
grey kangaroo meat or give me your healing. We understanding

ngalar moorital-kaarny koor-iddiny yukkininy nidja yongka ka
our family’s spirit returning (and) driving this grey kangaroo or

ngalar demangar kaarny walbrinniny ngalakut. Yay balaba Wadjalla
our grandparents spirit healing us. Now they (the) whiteman

maarlukal barminy – beean dukaniny ka kalunginy. Windjarl ngalar
(the) wild forest knocks down – destroys – breaks or burns. Where (does) our

kaarny koorl yay ? Kenyak !! Moen Nyoongar kudidjiny nidja waangk
spirit go now ? Finished !! Few people understand this talk

ka kaaree wangkiny. Balaba Wadjalla ngalar koolunga borl barunginy
or spirit talking. They (the) whiteman our children stole (and) grab,

yay balaba borl barunginy ngalar kaarny. Boordoo nidja ngalar
now they steal grab our spirit. Later this our

nookert djinninginy kudidjiny ngalar deman kenyak balaba
sleep seeing – understanding our grannies finished – they

barminy ngalar maarluk ngalar kaarny koorl minditj.
knock down our wild forest our spirit goes sick.

=======================================

SOURCES:

Noongar native title claim upheld by fed court
http://www.nit.com.au/breakingNews/story.aspx?id=7792

Noongar people win Native Title over Perth
http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2006/s1745134.htm

NATIVE TITLE RULING REJECTED
http://www9.sbs.com.au/theworldnews/region.php?id=131399&region=7

WA NATIVE TITLE CLAIM UPHELD
http://www9.sbs.com.au/theworldnews/region.php?id=131391&region=7

Perth area native title claimed
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20442751-421,00.html

Way open for other city claims
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20443390-601,00.html

Nyoongar people win native title over Perth
http://perth.indymedia.org/?action=newswire&parentview=31102

NOONGAR LAND – NOONGAR SPIRIT
http://www.schools.wafa.org.au/nyoongar.htm

The Nyoongar people of South Western Australia
http://www.multicultural.online.wa.gov.au/wppuser/owamc/march03news/noongar.html

Perth Indymedia – September 4, 2006 - Coca Cola says fizzy drinks not responsible for obesity

COCA-COLA is directly targeting mothers in a campaign to combat perceptions that it makes only sugary soft drinks. The company has launched a website devoted to raising awareness of its 80 product lines, which include diet soft drinks.

Nutritionist Rosemary Stanton said: “this is just clutching at straws.”

Advertisements for the website will appear in women’s magazines this week. It is the first time the company — rather than its brands — has directly addressed consumers. The move is widely seen as a reaction to negative publicity over the role of soft drinks in rising obesity levels. Similar campaigns are taking place in Europe and America.

Coca-Cola says media coverage in Australia of the obesity crisis has surged 70 per cent in the past three months.

Nutritionists and marketers are questioning the tone of the website, running under the slogans “make every drop count” and “make every drop matter”, especially its focus on promoting the need for people to “hydrate” constantly with Coke products

3,000 experts on the world’s epidemic of fat have descended on Sydney today to discuss the latest research on obesity. With breakfast brought to you by the Coca Cola corporation. Coca Cola scientist Doctor John Foreyt, says that fizzy drinks have been “victimised.”

The spiralling consumption of high-sugar, high-energy soft drinks has been a hot topic in the world of obesity research, and particularly regarding the spread of weight gain among teenagers.

But now the soft drink industry is hitting back with its own science.

Chaperoned by Coca Cola company representatives as the conference opened, Dr Foreyt says soft drinks have copped too much criticism in the war on fat. Dr Foreyt is dismissive of research suggesting that as much as half the 300 excess calories Americans consume every day come from sweetened drinks. “Well, calories are calories are calories, so you want to look at balance, and if people are getting their calories from one source, too many calories, people can get in trouble, but that caloric source can be anything.”

Dr Foreyt has links to the Beverage Institute – funded by Coca Cola. He laughs off suggestions his presence at the conference could be likened to a tobacco industry representative at a lung cancer meeting.

Susie Burrel from the Dieticians Association of Australia says sugary drinks are a major problem in the battle against the bulge.

The Director of the Australasian Society for the study of obesity, Tim Gill, says industry-sponsored research is becoming far too common. He says companies are using it to “muddy the waters on obesity debates.”

“when you’ve got a lot of money and you’re able to get together the right sort of panel and, more importantly, promote the information they’re presenting, what it tends to do is confuse a picture where there is generally a degree of consensus… soft drinks have been a major contributor to the increased calorie intake, particularly amongst teenagers, and that there’s a huge potential to address this problem by reducing soft drink intake.”

Said Dr Gill, at the week-long obesity congress, along with scientists funded by Coca Cola.

Similar campaigns are under way in Europe and the United States as part of a global public relations campaign.

Students in some British universities are banning the sale of Coke on campuses and a number of Indian states have banned the sale of the drink on the ground that it contains pesticides, a charge Coca-Cola vigorously denies.

Perth Indymedia PILBARA – 4 September, 2006.

“The gradual destruction since 1964 of the Dampier Cultural Precinct, Australia’s largest cultural monument, is unquestionably the planet’s most serious case of state vandalism in recent history. It exceeds the extent of cultural heritage destruction caused by the former Taliban regime of Afghanistan.” Robert G. Bednarik, CEO of the International Federation of Rock Art Organisations.

From the newswire:
PILBARA – 4 September, 2006. The Burrup Peninsula in the north-west of Western Australia is home to some of the oldest rock carvings on the planet, dating back tens of thousands of years. But corporate energy giant Woodside Petroleum wants to destroy much of the ancient rock artworks to build a fossil fuel plant as part of its Pluto gas project.

The Burrup (Murujuga or Puratha) is the largest of the islands that make up the Dampier Archipelago. The Burrup is an area of extreme heritage value and contains the largest and most significant collections of petroglyph (rock art) galleries in the world. [Burrup Peninsula - Discussion Forum]

For more than 10,000 years, Aboriginal peoples of the region carved petroglyphs into the area’s numerous rock faces and outcroppings. Collectively, these ancient renderings constitute the largest corpus of rock art in the world, with thousands of images of animals and people etched in stone. [The Dampier Rock Art Precinct - PDF]

Murujuga was listed on the National Trust Endangered Places 2002 Register. The Dampier Rock Art Precinct has been listed as one of 100 most endangered heritage sites on earth by the World Monuments Fund. Although the rock art complex has been listed as an endangered site by the National Trust, the art has been subjected to 40 years of disturbance, exposure to greenhouse gases and dust from a major industrial complex within the perimeter of the rock art site.

After inspecting Dampier rock art this August, the WA Heritage Council decided unanimously that it had the highest cultural significance. The International Rock Art Federation and Australia’s National Trust nominated the site for inclusion on the National Heritage List earlier this year. The National Trust said heritage listing was needed to prevent the engravings from being “blown up” during construction or damaged later by the plant’s emissions.

However it’s widely expected the State Government will greenlight the resource development at the expense of the artworks.

Wilfred Hicks, elder of the Wong-Goo-Tt-Oo West Ngarluma, has lived in the Pilbarra since he was born. He remembers walking on the Peninsula as a child, listening to his grandfather telling the history of the rock art on the Burrup.

“It breaks our heart to see all the destroyed art, rocks and that getting ripped up all the time and blown. It is a heartbreaking feeling. It makes us older generation cry about what they’re seeing happen. That is our bible. The Minghella gave that to us, and that’s Lord Jesus Christ. We’ve got it in our mind and on sand and on rocks,” said Mr Hicks.

The Environmental Protection Authority in Western Australia has defended its decision to approve the development of the Pluto Liquefied Natural Gas project on the Burrup Peninsula.

The Burrup alone possibly contains a million petroglyphs of which possibly 10,000 have already been destroyed.[Murdoch]

READ MORE/Comment…

 

September 4, 2006: A conservation group has taken a stand against whaling at a festival in Broome, in the north of Western Australia.

Meanwhile the battle for the worlds oldest rock art continues…

“If Stonehenge were in the Pilbara, it would no longer exist… The Government has now assumed the role of covert vandal in order to ride high on the resources boom.”

The event was designed to celebrate the links between the pearling town and the whale slaughtering nation of Japan. Thousands lined the street’s of Broome’s Chinatown for the start of the 10-day festival of pearls, Shinju Matsuri.

The festival focused on the sister city relationship between Broome and Taiji in Japan. Local green group Environs Kimberley made the most of the occasion, holding up a five-metre model whale and anti-whaling banners during the festival’s float parade, which was attended by Japanese dignitaries.

The group’s spokeswoman, Maria Mann, has denied it was a provocative move.
“We’re not doing it to offend anybody – we’re doing it to make a simple statement,” she said.

This year’s festivities are being sponsored by the Japanese company Inpex, the firm behind a $6 billion liquefied natural gas project off the Kimberley coast.

Meanwhile the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) in Western Australia defends its approval of the development of the Pluto Liquefied Natural Gas project on the Burrup Peninsula.

Major oil and gas producer Woodside wants to build a processing facility on the north-west peninsula, which houses what is believed to be the world’s biggest collection of aboriginal rock art.

The Greens are outraged at the EPA’s decision, and are calling on the state and federal governments to block the development. But EPA chairman Wally Cox says the project is unlikely to compromise environmental or cultural objectives.

But Federal Minister for the Environment Ian Campbell will consider a heritage request for Burrup peninsula. Indigenous claimants, the International Rock Art Federation and the National Trust nominated the site for inclusion on the National Heritage List earlier this year.

Their recommendations aim to protect the peninsula’s vast collection of ancient rock art.

Member for the state seat of Burrup Fred Riebeling fears the federal Minister, Senator Ian Campbell, will rule in favour of a heritage listing. He says: “The Commonwealth, if they do it, should be condemned as the biggest economic vandals in the history of Australia,” he said.

Robin Chapple, from the National Trust of Western Australia, says heritage listing of rock art on the peninsula would not hamper the state’s booming resources industry. “I mean, currently industry is citing the fact that the Burrup is a world heritage area and are choosing to go to Onslow and the Maitland Industrial Estate,” he said.

Greens Senator Rachel Siewert said she was also concerned that while the Minister is considering this listing, the Government of Western Australia is about to sign off on the destruction of even more rock art,” she said. “Ian Campbell has already spoken out in support of the extraordinary cultural heritage precinct of the Burrup.”

Ian Campbell said in June: “I see the value here, I see something quite remarkable, something unique, something that is important for generations to come.”

Yet destruction and relocation is still planned by Woodside Energy for one of the most densely carved areas of the Burrup. Trust spokesman Robin Chapple said the proposed site was one of the most concentrated areas, with over 1000 artefacts, some of which will be preserved.

“It’s almost obscene that the federal minister is deliberating on heritage values on this place, while the state minister is about to grant approval that would allow industry to build on what is one of the most significant archaeological sites on the Burrup,” Mr Chapple said.

The remote Pilbara peninsula has the biggest concentration of ancient rock art in the world, some of which is 30,000 years old, or seven times older than Britain’s Stonehenge. A preliminary Australian Heritage Council report, sent to Senator Campbell in May last year, said the entire peninsula qualified for both national and world heritage listing.

Burrup’s traditional owners told a July meeting of the state Aboriginal Cultural Material Committee, which oversees site protection, that they opposed any further industrial disturbance of rock art. They called for new industries to move away from the artefacts.

Indigenous author Sally Morgan, who is a claimant on rock art sites near the Burrup, has called for federal intervention to save artefacts.

“If Stonehenge were in the Pilbara, it would no longer exist,” she said. “The Government has now assumed the role of covert vandal in order to ride high on the resources boom.”

The federal Environment Minister has 20 days to decide whether the Burrup Peninsula should be listed or he may seek further public comment.

Despite the presence of the world’s oldest rock art in the area, federal Cabinet is expected to agree to work with the West Australian Government on a new development strategy for the peninsula.

This would allow companies such as Woodside Petroleum, which operates the $19 billion North West Shelf gas project, to press ahead with developments.

SOURCES

Shinju Matsuri Fest 2006
abc news
environs kimberley
EPA defends Burrup
Campbell considers Burrup
Campbell can stop rock art destruction
Deterioration of rock art
Dampier Rock Art Complex
World’s oldest rock art loses out to mine projects