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On Monday this week indigenous affairs minister Jenny Macklin held a public meeting at Alice Springs to listen to the views of the town campers whose homes she intends to compulsorily acquire in the very near future.
CAAMA Radio has been providing a local news service to Alice Springs residents for nearly 30 years and now is one of the most-widely heard — in a geographical sense at least — news organisations in the country.
CAAMA was provided with ad copy by Minister Macklin’s department, FaHCSIA to publicise the meeting. As CAAMA’s Radio Manager Jim Remedio told Crikey, CAAMA broadcast that copy in order to:
“… promote the meeting … thoughout the CAAMA broadcast area — two-thirds of the country. There was nothing in the ad copy to indicate that it was anything other than a public meeting - they [FaHCSIA] did not specify that it was a closed meeting at all — it was a public meeting and that’s how we announced it.”
CAAMA was also engaged by FaHCSIA to provide audio services to the meeting and to record it for FaHCSIA. Jim Remedio again:
“CAAMA had a contract with FaHCSIA to record the whole meeting for their purposes - so we were already there to do that for them - we already had a crew and the gear there set up to do that inside the meeting”
But when the CAAMA crews fronted up to cover a public meeting of great relevance to their listeners — the unprecedented seizure of their homes and land by the Commonwealth Government — they were shown the door.
Jim Remedio described the events:
“We had the crew inside to do the recording and our radio crew and our online news crew turned up to get some film — background footage — and to get some grabs. Then we were told by the Minister’s minder that we were not allowed to go into the meeting.
“… the Minister’s very young and obviously inexperienced media advisor told us we weren’t to go in to the meeting and a verbal stoush broke out — then we were surrounded by NT Police and Federal Police who were there as well. When the Feds started to move towards our broadcasters, well, we knew that if we hadn’t backed down we would have been told to get and would be escorted off the premises — we chose to exercise a bit of decorum and discretion and left of our own accord.”
Remedio says that the issue of CAAMA’s excluson was raised in the meeting:
“During the meeting at least one of the traditional owners of Alice Springs, who had witnessed the exclusion asked the Minister, ‘Why was CAAMA not allowed inside reporting on the meeting?’.
“The Minister and her minders just said word to the effect that ‘Oh, this is a closed meeting.’
“The Minister kept saying ‘I’m here to listen’, and people in the meeting kept saying things to her like ‘Well, you are not even listening to what this woman is saying to you about letting CAAMA in here so that they can tell other people what has been happening here.”
Remedio is concerned at this close management of the media.
“The first thing that came to my mind were the images that we’ve been seeing recently coming from overseas. But this is Australia - this is not Iran or Burma or Iraq. There has always been some manipulation of the media - we accept that - but this it is getting worse than ever.
“Some questions that I’d ask the Minister are: What has she got to hide? Is she afraid of closer scrutiny of what she says and what people say to her at these meetings? We know that the local people want us to be there.”
Crikey asked Minister Macklin whether her office had a blanket policy of excluding local Aboriginal media from public meetings between her and her advisors and/or FaHCSIA staff and Aboriginal people and their representatives, particularly in relation to meetings that concern the NT Intervention and related issues.
There was no response before this morning’s deadline.
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13 Comments
Why doesn’t this surprise me? I suggest, that people purchase some of those tiny recorders and give them to trusted friends who can tape the lot? Sounds a bit like having to resort to how journalists reported the election in Zimbabwe, and the assaults before and after etc? This is Australia isn’t it? Only when the politicians are embarrassed or shamed will they start behaving like decent human beings? This is a national disgrace! You don’t achieve positive results while engaging in such practices! I want to know what the local people are saying, as I want to understand the difficulties; what works and what doesn’t and how we can all contribute to a better environment for aboriginal people to live. This tactic is appalling! Outsmart them!Shame them! Be prepared for next time!
I’ll be sending Jenny Macklin an email of complaint. I suggest others do too!
What the hell happened here? If this had been a town meeting in a white community over a local issue and the same thing had been tried there would have been and almighty uproar!! This is Australia, not Zimbabwe or Iran. We are supposed to have freedom of the press in this country. Take care Jenny Macklin.
This is an absolute disgrace and time all Australians paid very close attention to what Minister Macklin is attempting to do in the NT.
“… the Minister’s very young and obviously inexperienced media advisor told us we weren’t to go in to the meeting and a verbal stoush broke out…”
I’m not surprised with such a disgracefully paternalistic and condescending attitude.
Were they also berated by your mob for being white, Mr Remedio?
“…we chose to exercise a bit of decorum and discretion and left of our own accord…”
From a fight YOU started…how charmingly adult of you.
CAAMA has a history of being the indigenous version of Today Tonight.
More than likely the ‘Aboriginal’ media were there to film a gotcha moment with the Minister.
Thankfully their efforts failed.
‘Most peculiar Mama’, like the fools who perpetrated this damaging behaviour, is talking nonsense. I just came back from the Alice last week. CAAMA run a a great radio station as well as being a fabulous musical repository. If they have been treated in this manner we can assume that talk about listening to indigenous people is nothing more than total bullshit. CAAMA is the voice of indigenous people but, much more than that, it is the voice of the Centre. I for one am appalled and deeply upset by this story.
‘Most peculiar Mama’ - your comments may carry a little more weight if you chose to identify both yourself and the basis of the comments you so obviously feel so passionately about.
The comment about the age and experience of the Minister’s media advisor is relevant and to me neither paternalistic or condescending - it is just an opinion. And there is no evidence of any ‘fight’ - just a verbal disagreement between a media minder and journalists trying to do their job - any journalist would react similarly, i.e. press their point, if they were being denied the opportunity to do their job.
As for the allegation that CAAMA has a reputation equal to TT - any evidence or instances to support that comment? Similarly with the ‘gotcha’ moment - from all the CAAMA TV and radio I’ve seen and heard - and I’ve seen a fair bit over the years - I’ve never come across any ‘gotcha’ moments - in my experience they just don’t work that way.
“…The comment about the age and experience of the Minister’s media advisor is relevant…”
Rubbish.
Worse, you see that as a legitimate screen in which to hide your prejudice behind.
“…And there is no evidence of any ‘fight’ - a verbal disagreement between a media minder and journalists trying to do their job…”
Do you even read your own copy? What part of “stoush” did you miss?
Put simply, CAAMA didn’t get what they wanted…they squealed and behaved like petulant children and were told to go away and grow up.
Is that the face Aboriginal media wishes to show to the rest of the country?
Were they expecting special treatment?
For people who don’t know CAAMA - Most Peculiar Mama is talking a load of CR#P! CAAMA is a very good broadcaster of programs in English and Indigenous languages. It has never been compared with TNT and these comments demonstrate that Most Peculiar Mama is either a Macklin stooge or a nut.
MPM - let me just repeat - do you have any material in support of your assertions and imaginings?
Maybe you might have some personal experiences you’d like to share with us all?
Leaving aside the rights or wrongs of doing this, is does seem like an odd thing to do. Surely whatever was said can be reported anyway, and by barring the media, particularly the indigenous media, it makes the whole thing look very sinister which presumable Macklin was trying to avoid by having the meeting in the first place. Apart from anything else it is pretty poor political strategy.
I won’t buy into the stoush as to the merits or otherwise of CAAMA, I will however tell you a bit about Minister Macklin and the Media at Yuendumu.
Our swimming pool was opened by Jenny Macklin last year. That morning “community leaders” were invited to meet with the Minister. When our own Warlpiri Media asked for permission to record that meeting, quick as a flash Ms.Macklin said “we have already agreed with the press that this is a private meeting” and there was to be no filming. Subsequently the (outside) media reported that the Yuendumu women were very happy with Income Management (IM) and not a thing about the petition presented to Ms.Macklin at that meeting (signed by over 300 people- a majority of women- objecting to the Intervention). In particular pictures of Jenny Macklin arm in arm with a smiling Peggy Nampijimpa Brown OAM were published. We at Yuendumu knew that Ms.Brown is one of the most ardent opponents to compulsory Income Management (half her pension is quarantined) yet newspaper articles had her supposedly saying that she was very pleased with IM.
On tuesday (a week ago) the ICC (Indigenous Co-ordination Commitee of FaCSIAH) came to Yuendumu to hold the much touted by Minister Macklin so called “consultations”. Most Yuendumu residents were unaware of the proposed meeting, and neither did they know what they were supposed to be about. The meeting was supposed to start at 10:30 a.m. A group of around 50 people had gathered and Warlpiri Media was getting ready to record the meeting (they do so as a matter of course so as to create a local record available to community members that might have missed the meeting or wish to review what transpired). The ICC official said that there was to be no filming inside. The alleged reason was something to do with privacy laws. No such reticence when the politicians bring along their media contingent! Anyway, a number of us objected (“we want proof”) and when some time later the lady invited us in to the meeting no one moved (“no local media… no meeting”). The Mexican stand-off lasted a bit over one hour, when a compromise was reached: filming would be allowed provided the ICC got a copy of the footage.
After it was explained on a white board what the meeting was about the first item for discussion was IM. Some angry outburst in Warlpiri (including one by Peggy Brown) set the ball rolling. The discussions lasted 3 hours and all local input for at least the first half the meeting was in the Warlpiri language. Whenever someone strayed into English a chorus of “Warlpiri wangkaya” would ensue. FaCSIAH had hired two locals as interpreters.
The next day we were advised that Jenny Macklin’s proposed visit to Yuendumu the following Tuesday had been deferred to a later date.
Lani-jarrija-mayi?
what is Macklin afraid of?
The truth.