Yirrkala bark petitions

Last updated

The Yirrkala bark petitions, sent by the Yolngu people, an Aboriginal Australian people of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, to the Australian Parliament in 1963, were the first traditional documents prepared by Indigenous Australians that were recognised by the Australian Parliament, and the first documentary recognition of Indigenous people in Australian law. The petitions asserted that the Yolngu people owned land over which the federal government had granted mining rights to a private company, Nabalco.

Contents

In 1971 the court decided that the ordinances and mining leases were valid, and that the Yolngu people were not able to establish their native title at common law, in a decision known as the Milirrpum decision, or the Gove land rights case.

History

Wali Wunungmurra, one of the 12 signatories to the petitions, describes the background of the petitions as follows:

"In the late 1950s Yolngu became aware of people prospecting for minerals in the area of the Gove Peninsula, and shortly after, discovered that mining leases had been taken out over a considerable area of our traditional land. Our response, in 1963, was to send a petition framed by painted bark to the Commonwealth Government demanding that our rights be recognised." [1]

Five brothers of the Rirratjingu clan, Mawalan Marika, Mathaman Marika, Milirrpum Marika, Dhunggala Marika and Dadaynga "Roy" Marika led the thirteen clans, [2] being traditional owners of the land in question. [3] Wandjuk Marika (son of Mawalan) helped to draft the bark petitions, [4] of which two of the four original petitions, which were signed by nine men and three women, [5] were sent to the Australian House of Representatives. The petitions were written in the Yolngu language, together with an English translation. They were tabled on 14 and 28 August 1963. [6] They are called bark petitions because, although typed on paper they were framed by traditional bark paintings. The typing was done on a Remington typewriter by author Ann E. Wells, wife of Rev. Edgar Wells, who was superintendent of the Yirrkala Methodist Mission at the time. [5]

The bark petitions asserted that the Yolngu people owned the land and protested the Commonwealth Government's granting of mining rights to Nabalco of land excised from the Arnhem Aboriginal Land reserve. [7] The son of one of the Yirrkala plaintiffs and painters, a Gumatj clan leader, Munggurrawuy Yunupingu, [8] [9] was Galarrwuy Yunupingu, who assisted in drafting the petitions. [10]

The petitions stated that "the land in question has been hunting and food gathering land for the Yirrkala tribes from time immemorial" and "that places sacred to the Yirrkala people, as well as vital to their livelihood are in the excised land". They expressed the petitioners' "fear that their needs and interests will be completely ignored as they have been ignored in the past". The petitions called on the House of Representatives to "appoint a Committee, accompanied by competent interpreters, to hear the views of the people of Yirrkala before permitting the excision" of the land for the mine and to ensure "that no arrangements be entered into with any company which will destroy the livelihood and independence of the Yirrkala people". Thus, the petitions are the first formal assertion of native title.

The Australian Government's response was to establish the a select committee known as the House of Representatives Select Committee on Grievances of the Yirrkala Aborigines, Arnhem Land Reserve, in 1963. In its report, the Select Committee recommended that the Yirrkala people should be compensated for the loss of their traditional occupancy, by way of (1) land grant; (2) payment of at least the first A$300,000 received in mining royalties; and (3) direct monetary compensation, even though Aboriginal land rights were not expressly recognised under Northern Territory laws. [11]

However, the recommendations of the House of Representatives Select Committee regarding compensation payments were ignored in the Mining (Gove Peninsula Nabalco Agreement) Ordinance 1968 (NT), [12] which unilaterally revoked part of the Yirrkala Aboriginal reserve in order to enable Nabalco to develop the mine.

The Aboriginal clans whose traditional lands were affected by the Gove project were so strongly opposed to the making of the Mining (Gove Peninsula Nabalco Agreement) Ordinance 1968 that they challenged it in the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory in 1968 in Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd (the "Gove land rights case"). In 1971 Justice Richard Blackburn held that the ordinances and mining leases were valid and that the Yolngu people were not able to establish their native title at common law. Justice Blackburn stated that the "doctrine of communal native title does not form and never has formed, part of the law of any part of Australia". [13]

The Milirrpum decision had wide-ranging impacts on relations between Aboriginal people and the mining industry generally throughout Australia. [14] In response to the Milirrpum decision, in 1973 the Whitlam government established the Aboriginal Land Rights Commission, headed by Justice Edward Woodward, [15] to inquire into "the appropriate means to recognise and establish the traditional rights and interests of the Aborigines in and in relation to the land, and to satisfy in other ways the reasonable aspirations of the Aborigines to rights in or in relation to land". [16]

Significance

The 1963 Yirrkala petitions were the first traditional documents prepared by Indigenous Australians recognised by the Australian Parliament, and are the first documentary recognition of Indigenous people in Australian law. [17] They were also the first formal assertion of native title in Australia.

Today

As of December 2023, the only surviving signatory of the petitions is Dhuŋgala Mununggurr. [5]

The two petitions presented to Parliament [5] are on permanent display at Parliament House, Canberra, [17] along with a digging stick known as the Djang'kawu digging stick, associated with the creation story of the Yolngu people. [18] A third petition is in the National Museum of Australia, also in Canberra. [5]

The fourth petition was found by historian Clare Wright at La Trobe University to be privately owned by the first wife of Stan Davey, who had been secretary of the Federal Council for Aboriginal Advancement in 1963. In the 1980s, Davey's ex-wife Joan McKie had moved to Western Australia and was living in Derby. In November 2022 Wright organised the handover of the petition to descendants of the original signatories. It was initially restored and conserved at Artlab Australia in Adelaide, before being repatriated to Arnhem Land, to go on permanent display at Buku-Larnŋgay Mulka Centre. The typewriter on which the petitions were typed has also been donated to the centre by the son of Ann and Edgar Wells. A repatriation ceremony was held on Thursday 7 December 2023 [5] [19] at the centre. [20] Among the attendees was Rirratjiŋu clan elder Witiyana Marika. [19]

The Yolŋu people are still contesting mining being carried out on their land without proper legal consultation through the courts. [19]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arnhem Land</span> Region in the Northern Territory, Australia

Arnhem Land is a historical region of the Northern Territory of Australia, with the term still in use. It is located in the north-eastern corner of the territory and is around 500 km (310 mi) from the territory capital, Darwin. In 1623, Dutch East India Company captain Willem Joosten van Colster sailed into the Gulf of Carpentaria and Cape Arnhem is named after his ship, the Arnhem, which itself was named after the city of Arnhem in the Netherlands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Galarrwuy Yunupingu</span> Aboriginal Australian activist (1948–2023)

Galarrwuy Yunupingu, also known as James Galarrwuy Yunupingu and Dr Yunupingu, was an Indigenous leader in the Australian community, and certainly in his homelands. He was involved in Indigenous land rights throughout his career. He was a Yolngu man of the Gumatj clan, from Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory. He was the 1978 Australian of the Year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yolŋu</span> Aggregation of Indigenous Australian people in northeastern Arnhem Land

The Yolngu or Yolŋu are an aggregation of Aboriginal Australian people inhabiting north-eastern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. Yolngu means "person" in the Yolŋu languages. The terms Murngin, Wulamba, Yalnumata, Murrgin and Yulangor were formerly used by some anthropologists for the Yolngu.

The Gove Peninsula is at the northeastern corner of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. The peninsula became strategically important during World War II when a Royal Australian Air Force base was constructed at what is now Gove Airport. The peninsula was involved in a famous court case known as the Gove land rights case, when local Yolngu people tried to claim native title over their traditional lands in 1971, after the Australian Government had granted a mineral lease to a bauxite mining company without consulting the local peoples. Today the land is owned by the Yolngu people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nhulunbuy</span> Town in the Northern Territory, Australia

Nhulunbuy is a town and locality in the Northern Territory of Australia. Founded on the Gove Peninsula in north-east Arnhem Land when a bauxite mine and deep water port were established in the late 1960s, the town’s economy largely revolved around its alumina refinery until it closed in May 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bark painting</span> Australian aboriginal art form

Bark painting is an Australian Aboriginal art form, involving painting on the interior of a strip of tree bark. This is a continuing form of artistic expression in Arnhem Land and other regions in the Top End of Australia, including parts of the Kimberley region of Western Australia. Traditionally, bark paintings were produced for instructional and ceremonial purposes and were transient objects. Today, they are keenly sought after by collectors and public arts institutions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yirrkala</span> Town in the Northern Territory, Australia

Yirrkala is a small community in East Arnhem Region, Northern Territory, Australia, 18 kilometres (11 mi) southeast of the large mining town of Nhulunbuy, on the Gove Peninsula in Arnhem Land. Its population comprises predominantly Aboriginal Australians of the Yolngu people, and it is also home to a number of Mission Aviation Fellowship pilots and engineers based in Arnhem Land, providing air transport services.

<i>Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd</i> First Australian Aboriginal land rights case, heard in the NT Supreme Court in 1971

Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd, also known as the Gove land rights case because its subject was land known as the Gove Peninsula in the Northern Territory, was the first litigation on native title in Australia, and the first significant legal case for Aboriginal land rights in Australia, decided on 27 April 1971.

<i>Where the Green Ants Dream</i> 1984 West German film

Where the Green Ants Dream is a 1984 English-language West German film co-written and directed by Werner Herzog, made in Australia. Based on a true story about Indigenous land rights in Australia but slated as a mixture of fact and fiction, the film only got a limited release in Australia and was not well received by critics, although it did fare a bit better in Europe and North America.

Raymattja Marika, also known as Gunutjpitt Gunuwanga, was a Yolngu leader, scholar, educator, translator, linguist and cultural advocate for Aboriginal Australians. She was a Director of Reconciliation Australia and a member of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. She was also a director of the Yothu Yindi Foundation and a participant in the 2020 Summit, which was held in April 2008. Marika advocated understanding and reconciliation between Indigenous Australian and Western cultures.

Wandjuk Djuwakan Marika OBE, was an Aboriginal Australian painter, actor, composer and Indigenous land rights activist. He was a member of the Rirratjingu clan of the Yolngu people of north-east Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia, and the son of Mawalan 1 Marika.

Narritjin Maymuru was a Yolngu people artist and activist noted for Bark painting. He began painting in the 1940s after time as a cook. After decades of work in 1979 he, and his son, became visiting artists at the Australian National University. His daughter Galuma Maymuru has become recognised as a significant Australian artist.

Roy Dadaynga Marika was an Aboriginal Australian artist and Indigenous rights activist. He was a member of the Marika family, brother of Mawalan 1 Marika, Mathaman Marika, Milirrpum Marika and Dhunggala Marika.

Dhuwarrwarr Marika, also known as Banuminy, a female contemporary Aboriginal artist. She is a Yolngu artist and community leader from East Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. She belongs to the Dhuwa moiety of the Rirratjingu clan in the homeland of Yalangbara, daughter of Mawalan Marika. Marika is an active bark painter, carver, mat maker, and printmaker.

Mungurrawuy Yunupingu (c.1905–1979) was a prominent Aboriginal Australian artist and leader of the Gumatj clan of the Yolngu people of northeastern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia. He was known for his bark paintings.

Ishmael Marika is a Yolngu musician, filmmaker, director and producer. His installations have been exhibited in many of Australia's most important museums, including the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney and the Art Gallery of South Australia in Adelaide. He is currently the Creative Director for the pre-eminent Indigenous media unit in Australia, the Mulka Project, based at Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Art Centre at Yirrkala in Northeast Arnhem Land. The Mulka Project seeks to preserve and disseminate the sacred languages and cultural practices of the Yolngu people by collecting and archiving photographs, audio and video.

Mawalan Marika (c.1908–1967), often referred to as Mawalan 1 Marika to distinguish from Mawalan 2 Marika, was an Aboriginal Australian artist and the leader of the Rirratjingu clan of the Yolngu people of north-east Arnhem Land, in the Northern Territory of Australia. He is known for his bark paintings, carvings and political activism.

Milirrpum Marika, also known as Jacky and also referred to simply as Milirrpum, was a Yolngu artist and community leader from East Arnhem Land, Northern Territory of Australia. He was best known for his involvement in the landmark court case Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd (1971), aka the Gove land rights case, which was the first significant legal case for Indigenous land right and native title in Australia and led to the federal Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1976.

Mathaman Marika (c.1920–1970) was an Aboriginal Australian artist and Indigenous rights activist. He was a member of the Rirratjingu clan of the Yolngu people of north-east Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, and one of the well-known Marika family, brother of Mawalan 1 Marika, Milirrpum Marika, Roy Dadaynga Marika, and Dhunggala Marika. Mathaman was second oldest after Mawalan.

Nancy Gaymala Yunupingu was a senior Yolngu artist and matriarch, who lived in Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, Australia. She worked at the Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Centre in Yirrkala, where her work is still held, and is known for her graphic art style, bark paintings and printmaking.

References

  1. ↑ "Journey goes full circle from Bark Petition to Blue Mud Bay". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 23 June 2009.
  2. ↑ "Our Campaign". Rirratjingu Aboriginal Corporation. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  3. ↑ "Leaders in law, business and community". Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations . Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  4. ↑ "The Marika family". National Museum of Australia. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Yirrkala Bark Petition returning to country". La Trobe University . 5 December 2023. Retrieved 11 December 2023.
  6. ↑ "Novel Plea By Tribal Group". The Canberra Times: 3. 15 August 1963. Retrieved 9 July 2017.
  7. ↑ The text of the Bark Petitions is available here.
  8. ↑ "Yirrkala bark petitions 1963". Magna Carta. Retrieved 3 April 2023.
  9. ↑ "Munggurrawuy Yunupingu". Aboriginal Bark Paintings. 11 August 2022. Retrieved 3 April 2023.
  10. ↑ "Galarrwuy Yunupingu AM". Referendum Council. 2 January 2019. Retrieved 3 April 2023.
  11. ↑ Australia. Parliament. House of Representatives, "Report of the Select Committee on Grievances of the Yirrkala Aborigines, Arnhem Land Reserve", Australian Government Printer, Canberra, 1963, at paragraphs 70, 72, 74
  12. ↑ Mining (Gove Peninsula Nabalco Agreement) Ordinance 1968 (NT)
  13. ↑ For an account of these developments, see Anne M Fitzgerald "Mining Agreements: Negotiated Outcomes in the Australian Minerals Sector" 2002, at pp 207-212
  14. ↑ R Howitt, J Connel and P Hirsh (eds), "Resources, Nations and Indigenous Peoples", Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1996 at pp 17-18.
  15. ↑ "Land-rights pioneer Sir Edward Woodward dead at 81". The Age . 16 April 2010. Archived from the original on 11 September 2021.
  16. ↑ Justice Woodward, "Aboriginal Land Rights Commission, First Report", Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, 1973 at p iii.
  17. 1 2 "Yirrkala bark petitions 1963 (Cth)". Documenting A Democracy. Museum of Australian Democracy. Retrieved 24 January 2020.
  18. ↑ "Yalangbara: Art of the Djang'kawu". National Museum of Australia . 29 July 2019. Retrieved 20 July 2021.
  19. 1 2 3 Garrick, Matt (10 December 2023). "Yolŋu bark petition repatriated to east Arnhem Land in remote NT after going 'missing' for decades". ABC News. Retrieved 11 December 2023.
  20. ↑ David, Justine (4 December 2023). "Yirrkala bark petitions : the fourth petition is coming home". East Arnhem Regional Council. Retrieved 11 December 2023.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.