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Black rights: the taboo subject that Nova says has cost her dearly

Nova Peris: First Aboriginal hockey-athletics international AUSTRALIAN sports coaches were stunned at the tenacity and allround ability shown by Nova Peris-Kneebone. She was a member of the Australian women’s hockey team which won the gold medal in the 1996 Atlanta (United States) Olympic Games. Not content to rest on her Hockeyroo laurels, Nova in 1997 transferred her thoughts to becoming a dual international. As a youngster whose parents came from Kakadu, she won just about all Little Athletics events she contested in Darwin (Northern Territory). Running was second nature to Peris, so she decided to fine tune her training and throw herself into sprinting. Firstly she trained in Melbourne with Australia’s Olympic 400metre silver medallist Cathy Freeman before moving to Sydney. There she lowered her sprint time from 12seconds down to an exceptional 11.51seconds in three months. At 26-years-old Nova was finally rewarded with selection in the Australian women’s team which went to Athens, Greece, to contest the world track and field championships where she performed creditably.

By Mark Metherell and AAP

22 May 2003 - She has won gold three times, captained Australia and was Young Australian of the Year. But when it comes to corporate recognition, Nova Peris is no success story.

She believes it is because of her strong stand on indigenous rights.

These days the former sports star is an ambassador for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission. In 1996 she became the first Aborigine to win an Olympic gold medal. That was at hockey. After switching to athletics, she scored two golds in the 1998 Commonwealth Games.

But the 32-year-old poses a rueful question: "And a black outspoken woman on indigenous rights doesn't pick up one major sponsor?"

Yesterday Peris, who is the granddaughter of one of the stolen generation, said she was considering going into politics. She wouldn't say what party - she will reveal her plans next month - but did say "it wouldn't be Liberal".

Peris made no secret that, if she entered Federal Parliament, she would push for it to make an official apology to indigenous people. "It's got to come from the top," she said. "Because it's all very well for a lot of people to come and pay their respects and walk across bridges, but until it's recognised in the constitution as an injustice of the past, and to acknowledge the indigenous people in our constitution, it really doesn't mean much until it comes from the top."

As for not making it in the world of television commercials, she said: "I'm too outspoken on indigenous issues."

She said corporate executives had "tried to convince me not to be outspoken and tried to compare me with other indigenous people who just get on with their jobs".

"I've never been upset about it. I'd rather walk away and know that I've been true to myself. I don't think what I'm saying is
controversial, it's just the truth, and people don't like to hear the truth."

She said the success of indigenous sportspeople like herself, Cathy Freeman, scores of footballers and now Patrick Johnson did help to break down the racial barriers. But resistance to concepts of an indigenous treaty and recognition of indigenous suffering remained. "It comes back to the fact that people just don't want to know."

Source: Sydney Morning Herald

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