Michael Bleby; 18/1/10
Michael Bleby is an Australian journalist working in Johannesburg for Business Day, South Africa’s main business daily.
On the surface, Australia and South Africa face different challenges to do with reconciliation. Australia is grappling with the entrenched problems plaguing an indigenous population that makes up just 2.5 per cent of the national total, or 500,000 people. In South Africa, the imbalance continues to affect the nine out of every 10 people who are not white – some 44 million. But the questions policy makers in the two countries grapple with are similar. As Aboriginal rights advocate Mick Dodson said during a visit to South Africa late last year, reconciliation requires social justice. ”It is the prospect of genuine employment, good health, of choices and opportunities free from discrimination,” the 2009 Australian of the Year told an audience in Pretoria. He made it clear that this was an issue of human rights – and acts such as the apology the then-new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd gave to victims of the ”Stolen Generation” last February, were not enough.
See: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/apologies-made-time-for-action-20100117-me8i.html; Time to put native title to work for its owners; Marcus Priest; 18/1/10; http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/by/marcus-priest; Marcus Priest is a lawyer, journalist and a former adviser to the federal Attorney-General, Robert McClelland
Tags: Aboriginal, Australia, Human Rights