On Thursday 12 August there was a national tele-conference of indigenous leaders re the revised Preamble. Media Release from that meeting, (dated 12 August) "DROP THE PREAMBLE [text] The proposed question on the draft preamble to the Australian Constitution should be dropped from the forthcoming Republic referendum. This was the unanimous position adopted by Indigenous leaders during a national telephone conference today. The conference agreed that the consultation process over the draft preamble which was released by Prime Minister John Howard was fundamentally flawed. The preamble, which was meant to be an aspirational document to unite the nation, had been drafted behind closed doors without nay meaningful consultation with the Australian people, Indigenous and non/Indigenous. The draft document, which is insensitively drafted, also fails to recognise the inherent and distinct rights of the first nations which have been recognised by the High Court. Given the flaws in the process, the absence of any real recognition of Australia's first nations and the desperate attempts to rush the legislation through the Parliament we call for the preamble question to be dropped from the forthcoming referednum. There should be one question: Should Australia become a republic? The following leaders participated in the tele-conference: Parry Agius Richie Ah Mat Gatjil Djerrkura Pat Dodson Dr Mick Dodson Norman Fry Olga Havnen Michael Mansell Dr Lowitja O'Donohue Dr Charlie Perkins David Ross ARchie Tanner Peter Yu Further comment through Olga Havnen (0409 991 761) or ATSIC OFfice of Public Affairs, Brian Johnstone (0419 010 687) ------------------------------------------------------- RecOzNet2 has a page @ http://www.green.net.au/recoznet2 and is archived at http://www.mail-archive.com/ To unsubscribe from this list, mail [EMAIL PROTECTED], and in the body of the message, include the words: unsubscribe announce or click here mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20announce This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use." RecOzNet2 is archived for members @ http://www.mail-archive.com/
