October 19, 2002	Saturday	Sha'aban 12, 1423

MELBOURNE: Nearly two centuries ago, proclaiming yourself to be an Aborigine on the Australian island state of Tasmania could have cost you your life.

But now, with millions of dollars’ worth of government funding, and political power, at stake, hundreds of people are clamouring to be acknowledged as Tasmanian indigenous Australians by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC).

“The Tasmanian Aborigines were supposed to have died out, but now it looks like more people than ever before want to be Aboriginal — it’s almost become fashionable,” Lyndall Ryan, a professor of Australian Studies, said.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the number of Aborigines in Tasmania, which has a total state population of 456,000, increased 13.7 per cent in the past five years to 15,773.

Of those, 1,298 people applied to be on ATSIC’s Tasmanian indigenous electoral roll, which would allow them to vote in the powerful commission’s election later this year.

More than 2,500 objections were lodged during the Tasmanian registration process and the Independent Indigenous Advisory Committee rejected more than 500 applicants — including a woman whose brother had been accepted.

Around 113 of those excluded are currently appealing, including Tasmania’s current ATSIC chairman John Clark.

“My whole family has been challenged, not just me. I have got aunties who are 80 years of age and they are totally devastated and shattered. This is just black politics, it’s the same as white politics,” Clark said.

ATSIC is Australia’s national policy-making and advocacy organization for indigenous people and presides over an annual budget of around A$1.2 billion ($659 million).

But despite all the money ploughed into helping the 400,000 Aborigines nationwide, they are still the most disadvantaged group in Australia, likely to die 20 years earlier than other Australians and 15 times more likely to be jailed.

The situation has led to calls, even from within the indigenous community, for a change in Aboriginal policies to move away from welfare handouts and address what has been described by Aboriginal leaders as an “inferno of social disintegration”.

DARK HISTORY: The question of Aboriginality has long been an issue in Tasmania due to a misconception that the entire indigenous population was wiped out by European settlers in the early 19th Century.

Fighting between European settlers and Aborigines prompted a declaration of martial law, culminating in the infamous “black line” in 1830 — a human chain of settlers and soldiers who marched across the state to eradicate the indigenous population.

It was believed by many that Truganini, a woman who died in 1876, was the last Tasmanian Aborigine and her body was even placed on display for around 40 years in the Tasmanian Museum.

“Although we think about 400 to 500 survived, I certainly think it is hard to have this many people in 2002 claiming to be Tasmanian Aborigines,” said Ryan, who gave evidence during the appeals.

The test applied to applications for the indigenous electoral roll was self-identification, community acceptance and descent, which has led some people to resort to DNA testing in an effort to prove their heritage.

“We brought in a similar test about five years ago because there was a lot of non-Aboriginal people using our services and it was very overwhelming,” the secretary of the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre (TAC), Jay McDonald, said.

“The TAC supports the idea of an indigenous electoral roll to try and weed out the imposters. The true Aboriginal community is suffering because of these imposters.”

Despite the furore being created in Tasmania, it is likely the ATSIC indigenous electoral roll will be implemented across Australia.

“It’s not an easy process to go through. It’s not black and white. But I think this may be the start of having a stronger community that can work together,” ATSIC Commissioner for Tasmania, Rodney Dillon, said.—Reuters