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Aborigines recover vast territory

27 September 2002 - In a remote desert ceremony, an Australian judge on Friday handed over rights to a huge swathe of land to the Martu Aboriginal tribe.

Dressed in his ceremonial robes, federal judge Robert French conducted the court session in the Parnngurr rock holes in western Australia to return the 136,000 square kilometres (54,000 square miles) to the tribe.

The area - more than four times the size of Belgium - is the largest piece of land to be returned to Aboriginal control since land claims began to be settled 10 years ago.

Although the Aborigines will be allowed to hunt, gather, fish and use the area's natural resources, they will not have ownership of the rich mineral and petroleum deposits which exist there.

"The Martu's been struggling for a long time. It's one of those things that will ease a lot of our people's minds or give them peace," said Bobby Roberts who lodged the claim for the 2,000 strong tribe.

Martu community of Cotton Creek (Pangurr) with Mt Cotton in the foreground. Cotton Creek is the closest community to the Kintyre uranium test site, and lies within Rudall River/Karlamilyi National Park. The Martu people have come under a lot of pressure to sign an agreement to mine. Even Mt Cotton has been examined by Rio Tinto and found to contain uranium. Western Australia encompasses a third of the area of the Australian continent. It is the last frontier for the nuclear industry - no uranium mines have ever gone into full production in Western Australia.

"It was really hard. We were trying to tell someone the land we were fighting for was (always) ours. But the way we had to prove it took us a long time," he said.

The Martu were driven off the land in the 1950s, when the British government wanted to use it to test intercontinental ballistic missiles.

They began their fight to be given legal title to the land six years ago.

Though small in number, the Martu speak 12 different Aboriginal languages and maintain a traditional lifestyle, hunting kangaroos and wild birds.

In 1992, a ruling quashed the idea that Australia had been empty until the arrival of European colonisers in the 18th Century.

That opened the way for Aborigines to lay legal claim to lands they had traditionally inhabited.

Aborigines, who number about 400,000 among 19 million Australians, are among the poorest sections of society and claim discrimination is widespread against them.

Source: BBC

Desert court recognises Martu title rights

27 September 2002 - A fully-robed federal court judge sitting in desert country in remote WA has formally recognised the Martu people's rights to Australia's biggest land claim - double the size of Tasmania.

After six years of negotiations, recognition has been given to the Martu people's traditional ownership of 136,000 square kilometres in WA's East Pilbara, taking in parts of the Gibson and Great Sandy deserts.

The people, made up of 12 different language groups, came into contact with European Australians only in the 1950s, when they were taken from their land to accommodate Britain's testing of the "Blue Streak" missile.

The Martu returned to the area in the early 1980s.

The native title claim was lodged in late 1996, originally over a 153,000 square kilometre area, including the Rudall River National Park.

But the park is not included in the final determination because of the High Court's recent ruling in the Miriuwung-Gajerrong case, which said the vesting of a reserve extinguished native title.

The determination was reached by consent between the Martu and seven other parties, including the WA government, Newcrest Mining, Rio Tinto Exploration and Telstra.

It recognises the Martu's rights to hunt, gather and fish and to use natural resources such as ochre, soils, rock and stones, flora and fauna.

Those rights do not extend to ownership of minerals and petroleum, and public access to the Canning Stock route is preserved.

Claimant Bobby Roberts, 50, said he was shocked the determination finally had been ratified.

"The Martu's been struggling for a long time. It's one of those things that will ease a lot of our people's minds or give them peace," Mr Roberts said.

"It was really hard. We were trying to tell someone the land we were fighting for was (always) ours but the way we had to prove it took us a long time."

National Native Title Tribunal deputy president Fred Chaney said the Martu had really been fighting for recognition of their traditional ownership of the land for a generation.

"It's a mark of the importance that Aboriginal people put on their connection with the land that ... they didn't give up," Mr Chaney said.

Deputy Premier Eric Ripper said the determination was unusual in that it also specified an area of overlapping native title rights between the Martu and Ngurrara people.

Federal Court justice Robert French ratified the determination in an area of the Pilbara known as Parnngurr rockholes.

Source: AAP

related links:

• Native Title
• Native Title case history by Rod Hagen
  The Rights of Indigenous Australians; Mabo; Wik; The Native Title Act; The Ten Point Plan and Harradine Amendments (external link)
• Kintyre - Cut from the Rudall River National Park, Rio Tinto's Kintyre Uranium Mine proposal has always been opposed by the local Traditional Owners, the Martu People.
• Australian Aborigines Return Home
  26 September 2002 - Pravda - Australian aborigines will be granted property rights to a large section of a dester, the area of which is about 130 thousand kilometers. This territory makes up almost two percent of Australia. It is the largest territory ever given back to the native population after 50 years of expulsion.
• WA's Martu people achieve Native Title recognition in Western desert
  27 September 2002 - Media Release, NATIONAL NATIVE TITLE TRIBUNAL - The Martu People of Western Australia will today be recognised as the native title holders of a 136,000 square kilometre area of the Western Desert - the largest native title determination to be made in Australia to date.

Further information: native title issues page - includes news index and external links