A happy NAIDOC week to you.
NAIDOC was first celebrated in 1975 and since then, I believe we have come a long way towards reconciliation.
When the Yugambeh people lived here, for centuries, they loved it so much that one of them said “There was no better place to live” (Quote from NITV doco on Logan’s Indigenous history. January 2016).
In 1826 , Patrick Logan explored the Logan River and it was in 1846 that the first leases were granted to immigrant squatters.
At first, the ancient and the new lived side by side, but more farmers took up land and the traditional owners were brutally repressed, sometimes by the Native Police.
Although I was very grateful for the chance to live here, I could not overlook the fact that my gain was someone else’s loss.
I welcomed the passing of Native Title by the Keating government.
For the first time, I felt that I could look my black sisters and brothers in the face and honestly say that we were trying to make up for past wrongs.
I am still looking for the answer to the question: How can we make up for the loss of black lives and culture caused by white expansion?
But I do believe that constitutional recognition of the fact that life in this land did not just start in 1788, is another step along the way to a full healing.
When this occurs, we will not only have a rich history…but also a just future.
Paul Wincen,
via email.
