City of Melbourne would rather reinforce White Australia Policy-esque fiction than walk with us

On January 26, 2015, I watched news footage of Invasion Day rallies across the country. What particularly struck me was a clip from the Naarm (Melbourne) rally showing the late sovereignty activist Vivian Malo pushing aside a barrier fence that had been erected for the annual Australia Day Parade run by the Victorian government. Protesters followed Malo through those barriers and marched down the parade route, effectively taking it over, while confused attendees looked on.

This action told the government “We’re not going anywhere”, and it set the scene for everything that has followed. I still find it difficult to describe the pride I felt watching it unfold.

That year, for the first time in ages, I was up on my homelands (Alice Springs), and I attended a small protest. I had been going to Indigenous rights protests ever since I was a kid, and January 26 had always featured an Invasion/Survival Day protest of some kind, with attendance rarely overwhelming. Generally, they were an occasion to hear speeches, catch up with other Indigenous community members, and reflect on how, despite the mainstream media’s best efforts, we were still here. We would march, but we were often held back from making an impactful statement.

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That all changed on that day in 2015. Malo and the other staunch activists showed me that a small number of people (about 1,000) could indeed make an impact. Warriors of the Aboriginal Resistance — a grassroots, youth-led Indigenous activist collective — seized that moment, and kept up the pressure over the next two years. Week after week, they were on the streets, shutting them down to protest against the forced closures of Aboriginal communities, deaths in custody, the taking of children, and more. Their work is the reason I decided to lend a hand in the organisation of Invasion Day rallies, and why 50,000 people showed up to the Melbourne protest in 2017. Ever since, that crowd has only continued to grow.

I recall this history to make a point: it takes a special kind of wilful racism and stupidity for someone to ignore what is right in front of their nose. And yet, recently the City of Melbourne did just that: ignoring the momentum behind Invasion Day protests, it decided to abandon its advocacy for the federal government to move Australia Day celebrations to another date, and is considering reinstating the very Australia Day parade that Malo and others effectively dismantled in 2017.

For years, the largest public gatherings across the country have been the Invasion Day rallies. One of the simplest reasons the Australia Day parade in Melbourne ceased was that, even at its height of public attendance, it could not compete with the numbers at Invasion Day. On what is often a scorcher of a day, the people vote with their feet, marching for Indigenous rights, inclusion, multiculturalism and democracy. They do so to mark the past, and to move towards a better, and more truthful, future. 

The City of Melbourne could have walked with us and embraced that show of community. It could have acknowledged that the Day of Mourning protest — which was partially organised by Aboriginal activists based in Melbourne — predates the official gazetting of January 26 by nearly six decades. Instead, the council would apparently rather reinforce White Australia Policy-esque fiction.

Mayor Nicholas Reece has made mealy-mouthed remarks that the decision to celebrate the day is a federal one, rather than a local or state one. But the City of Melbourne is a powerful council in an important state, and its stance matters. It’s disingenuous to pretend otherwise. Beyond the Keating government stating “Yep, we’re going with this day” in 1994, what historical relevance does the date hold for Victoria, the city of Melbourne, or even the federation of Australia as a whole?

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Perhaps if the councillors walked with the rally, they would realise that investigating whether it has room in its budget for “a number of multicultural celebrations to complement its annual citizenship ceremony” was pointless. A multitude of communities join the Invasion Day protest in solidarity: over the years, I have witnessed a host of different multicultural groups coming along with their banners, and rally speaking lists that have included members of other Indigenous communities across the globe. It’s offensive for the council to erase these groups’ shows of solidarity with some possible promise of activity funding at the Town Hall.

As I have said countless times, the concept of “changing the date” is more a mainstream take, rather than an Indigenous one, on why we march on January 26. As an Arrernte woman, I march because our communities have marched or protested (for example, by establishing the Tent Embassy) for decades. If Australia changed the date of their allegedly beloved “Australia Day”, I can’t say I would stop protesting on January 26, nor do I believe other Aboriginal people would. By continuing to march, we’re following the example of activists who walked before us, and challenging this country on how far it still has to go.

Beyond whitewashing history, kowtowing to right-wing threats, and reinforcing the message that multicultural groups should need to adhere to these falsehoods to fit in, what exactly is the City of Melbourne marking on that day?