Aboriginal leader available for talks
Diet Simon - 04.01.2004 12:31
An Australian Aboriginal leader visiting Europe for a few weeks is available to give talks. Michael Anderson (Nyoongar Ghurradjong Murri, Ghillar) was recently elected Chairman of the Gumilaroi Nation of 15,000 people, Australia’s second largest Aboriginal group, who are spread through northern New South Wales and southern Queensland.
Tears of joy after winning a land rights court judgement, later overturned.
Ghillar was one of the half dozen young activists who in 1972 set up the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra. He’s a jurist, historian, painter, former university lecturer and former professional rugby player who has campaigned for Aboriginal rights in Australia and internationally for 30 years.
He once stripped to his underpants and threw a Union Jack flag wrapped around a ceremonial spear over the fence into the grounds of Buckingham Palace as TV cameras whirred. It was symbolism to take the evil back to where it started, he explains. "Actually, you're supposed to do it naked, but I didn't think I'd get away with that."
Ghillar will be in London from 11 to 14 January to try to start legal proceedings against The Crown for allowing Australian governments to make laws harming the Aborigines. He says he and his legal advisers have found a precedent in British law where a king was decapitated for the same offence, namely passing laws harming the Irish.
Ghillar and his German wife now spend most of their time working a sheep farm near Hebel in southern Queensland which is slowly becoming a centre for Aboriginal recovery in the area.
He can be contacted in Germany at telephone #49 - 2844 – 15 19, Sapotnik. He’s available until 22 January.
 E-Mail: Anderson's email: ngurampaa@bigpond.com
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