Chapter 13

Bureaucratic Bastards

In mid November a major problem arises requiring Mack to get involved in work he doesn’t want to do, but he has to for the tribe. For some reason unknown to the elders some federal and state government departments have sent letters demanding their officers have seats on the management board of Walkers Enterprises. If the tribe agrees the board would more than double and give the real control of the company to the government. Copies of the letters are sent to all of the tribal leaders and a special joint meeting of the Council of Elders and Circle of Women is held one evening with several of them attending via a conference call.

After a few hours of discussion Mack says, “Marker, please confirm for me. It’s my understanding the tribe has never accepted any of the special state or federal funds to help tribes and the company was set up with the personal money from people who worked full-time in normal jobs, not special government sponsored ones.”

Marker replies, “Correct, Mack. That’s how it is. We’ve not used a cent of government money, not even any from people on the normal benefits. They have no cash involvement at all. In fact, we’ve operated for nearly forty years without them even being aware of us.”

“OK! I doubt we can deal with this in the normal way we deal with the departments. We need to take the offensive on this. It’s time to go to war with the government, but to do it the modern way,” is Mack’s reply.

Several of the others interrupt, but it’s Hammer who asks the key question, “Mack, what do you mean by ’the modern way’ of war?”

“Just that. We’ll hit them in the state and federal courts and in the media. We start legal action against the people who signed the letters, the permanent heads of the departments, the ministers, the premier, the prime minister, and the governments as a whole. Sue them all in the state and the federal courts for everything we can think of. We’ll start with ’demanding with menaces,’ racial discrimination, breaking the laws on assumption of property, and anything else the lawyers can think of. At the same time we go to the media news programs about this.”

Mr Able asks, “How can we hit them with racial discrimination?”

“It’s obvious. The only reason they’re doing this is because the board members and shareholders are Aboriginals, thus they’re practising racial discrimination as they had no interest before they found that out. We need to hit them in the normal courts as criminal and civil suits and also all of the special courts we can think of, like the Equal Opportunities Commission courts. Let’s bury all of the bastards in court orders.”

The discussion goes on for another hour before it’s agreed Mr Barnes will head up a team consisting of Marker, Hammer, Ma Hanson, Mrs Burns, Mack, and himself. They’re to set out a detailed strategy and to carry forward the media campaign. The six agree to meet the next night.

The next night the strategy team talks about what to do and how to do it. They agree on involving Mr Watts, the company president from Sydney, in the media activities, mainly because he’ll need to coordinate and manage the media events in Sydney. They also decide to kick it off in Canberra. When the meeting breaks up Mack asks Marker to bring a certain large sealed box from his bedroom when they come down for the Canberra media launch Mr Barnes will organise for a Friday night as soon as the court papers are ready to be served.

The Friday of the first week of December is an interesting day. In the morning the company lawyers are in many venues lodging paperwork to initiate a large number of court cases before the various courts. They arrange for court approved officials to deliver the papers to the various individuals and government departments involved. In the evening the strategy team, enlarged by Mr Watts, is sitting in three lounges with a host of cameras and media people in the open area in front of them. The seating is important as each lounge is big enough for four people. From the left to the right is Mrs Burns and Mack on the first lounge; Mr Barnes and Ma Hanson on the middle lounge; Marker, Hammer, and Mr Watts on the right hand lounge. Mack has a case beside his lounge.

At the set start time Mr Barnes waves for silence and says, “Thank you all for coming tonight. Before we get to the main point of the reason for this media conference I’ll ask Elder Dean to give a little history talk. Please keep all of your question until we ask for them. Mack, your turn.”

Mack takes a deep breath and he sits up a bit more before saying, “My name is Mack Dean - that’s M A C K with a family name of D E A N. I was named after a truck, I’m sure you can guess which one.” There’s a little laughter at that. “There’s no Aboriginal DNA in my blood line yet I’m a tribal elder in two ways. We’ll come to that later.” A few shocked expressions at that, and a little murmuring. “Over two hundred years ago the British government organised an invasion of this continent they saw as being empty. In the following centuries a sort of war was fought between the Aboriginal inhabitants and the European colonists. Often the war was organised by the colonial officials, sometimes by colonists, and sometimes by the Aboriginals. Who started which individual fight and why is no longer relevant today. The result is the invaders won the war and took control of all of the land by killing most of the inhabitants in the process. As a result of this the Aboriginals were disenfranchised and seen as non-people. About fifty years ago a movement to recognise the Aboriginals gained momentum, and it has since gained much ground to have them recognised as Australians with the same rights as the other Australian citizens. About forty years ago some government funds were made available to the Aboriginal people with the claimed aim to help them rebuild their culture and fit into today’s society. About thirty years ago laws were passed to stop discrimination based on race and other grounds. That’s the general brush strokes of history relevant to what we are here about tonight.” He stops to have a sip of water.

He looks up at the cameras and says, “Another historical part is what occurred in what many call ’The Dreamtime’ that’s about fifty thousand years ago. The tribe we represent used to live on lands just to the east of Darwin. Invaders from the north were more numerous and vicious than our ancestors, and pushed us from those lands. A generation later they expanded and pushed us from our new lands. The elders of the time chose to move well away, and thus a long walk from there to where we are now in the mountains near the city of Rivers. Due to the many years this took we changed our name and it now translates into English as ’The people of the long walk of many seasons,’ or Walkers for short.”

After another sip Mack says, “As you can see from that history the tribe is used to people invading and taking our lands. In order to preserve the tribe we’ve gone to great lengths to avoid wars where we can, mostly by moving on. But when the Europeans arrived there was nowhere left to move to. The tribe faced total destruction by the whites. That didn’t occur due to another history lesson.” He stops to make eye contact with most of them as his eyes rove over the audience to be sure he has their attention. “About two hundred years ago a white settler moved into the mountains near where the Walkers lived. He set up his camp and started to work logging trees to sell to people living on the plains below. His name was James Kelly, known as Jim Kelly. He was Irish and he hated authorities, especially British ones. So when the British Colonial authorities arrived to do something about the local Aboriginals he told them there was no trouble and sent them away, mainly because he had no trouble with them. Since that day the Kelly family has helped to protect and preserve the Walkers tribe. The journals they’ve kept recount over thirty individual incidents where the family took up arms to fight off and kill the other whites seeking to kill the Aboriginals. There are many cases of them providing medical help and food as needed. Because of his help Jim Kelly was made an elder of the tribe, and his family and descendants were declared to be members of the tribe for all time. The name the tribe gave them was Jemkala as that was how his name sounded to them. About a hundred and thirty years ago another family of Irish moved into the area and they started to work for the Kelly clan. About twenty years ago the last of the direct line of the Kelly family married the last of the direct line of that clan. Thus the family name of the head of the Kelly clan and the Jemkala clan within the tribe is now Dean.” This gets some surprised looks and murmurs. “In order to enable the Kelly family to better protect the tribe the details of who the Jemkala was became a close kept secret within the tribe as well as the local community. Because of this secret the other whites did not know the Kelly family actively worked with the tribe. This happened within the first generation, so over the years the story of the Jemkala - The White Elder became as legend to most of the tribe and the other tribes that split off from it in the area. From when I was ten I was the head of my family and I took on the responsibility to care for the tribe, which I did. When I was sixteen I was adopted into the tribe on my own account and made a special elder to see to the tribe’s welfare due to my prior efforts in that area.” He stops for another drink and leans back.

Mr Barnes speaks up, “When we made Mack an elder it was because of what and who he was himself. I was one of the four who knew he was the Jemkala but I didn’t speak of it because many years earlier it had been agreed not to make this secret public until after he was eighteen. In order to resolve a recent serious matter concerning the tribe’s welfare Mack had to disclose this secret early. Thus Mack was made an elder at sixteen, but he was also born an elder because he is the Jemkala - The White Elder. That is why he is here with us tonight. He, like his ancestors, is here to stand with us and to help protect us from further attacks by the authorities. Your turn, Marker.”

Marker says, “My name is Marker Hanson. I’m an elder of the tribe and also the Chief Executive Officer of the tribe’s company. About forty years ago a number of the tribe’s members raised the funds to set up a company. They were all employed as loggers but they wanted to create their own crew. However, no one would negotiate with an Aboriginal fairly then. Thus a company was created from their wages and a white man was employed to be president and negotiate the contracts. Mister Watts is the president of Walkers Enterprises, the company created. Not one cent of government money was used to create the company or to help run it. We’ve always paid the full taxes too. Over the years the company has slowly grown. In the middle of last year we had the opportunity to purchase the largest single block of logging land in our area which is worth over twenty-five million dollars. At that time a private company offered us a commercial loan of enough to buy the property. We made the purchase and we’ve been paying the loan back from the income generated by logging on the land, which includes many special timbers thought to be logged out. We also borrowed some money from a bank to buy the sawmill in Ryan’s Ridge when it came up for sale. As well as meeting our loans we generated the funds to complete the development of a village on the land we bought. Many years ago it was started by the previous owners. Unlike them we were able to devote a lot more resources to it and we now have a hundred and seventy houses for our people to live in on the property. We’ve also bought more land and houses in the region. The company has been reinvesting most of its income into more assets and paying back our loans. We have a very strong asset to liability ratio and have over thirty-five million dollars of assets. With most of that growth in the last eighteen months.”

There’s a lot of quiet talk by the reporters when he settles back into his lounge. Mr Barnes clears his throat and says, “Now you have all the history and background we come to the point of tonight.” He points to the table to the side where a few people are putting out some papers, “On your way out you can collect a printed copy of our media release which includes all we’ve said and all we’re about to say, with copies of the supporting documents.” He stops for a sip of water. “A few weeks ago we received demands from certain state and federal government departments that we give them seats on our board of directors. If we do they will have control of our company. For forty years they had no interest while we struggled to exist, despite all of their past attacks. Now we’ve managed to become a success through our own hard work and the work of the Jemkala the governments want to steal it from us. We have nowhere left to go, no place to run or hide now. This time we stand our ground. This time we fight back. This time we fight them on their terms. Today we started actions in a number of courts at the state and federal level, civil and criminal as well as special courts. We’ve had papers served on all of the officials and departments involved, right up to the ministers and the whole governments. We’re charging them with various crimes under many laws, including discrimination because they’ve made it clear in their letters the reason for their actions is racially based. We’re suing for all of our costs and time and compensation for the trouble they caused with this attack. We expect the bureaucrats and the politicians to delay these matters in the courts and to drag them out until they think we can’t pay the costs. Thus we now ask you and the Australian people to join us and help us to fight these thieving bigots. The best way you can help us fight them is to complain to your local members at the state and federal level and in the ballot box. In the next two years we have state and federal elections, vote these current thieves out. We beg you to replace all of the elected officials if they don’t make their petty bureaucratic thieves behave. Tonight we start a media campaign to defend ourselves. Ma Hanson and I represent the tribe’s leaders and will handle matters in the Rivers Region. Marker and Hammer represent the company and will handle matters for it while Mister Watts will represent our interests in Sydney. Mack and Missus Burns will represent us here in Canberra in the future. Thank you for coming. We’ll have a short break and then answer questions, if you have them after you read the papers set out for you.”

Mack interrupts, “Just one last thing.” All turn to him because this is not part of the plan. “For many centuries this tribe has only gone to war when a special ceremonial club was raised. It’s the general belief in the tribe the club was lost many generations ago. It was not. One hundred and fifty years ago it was given to the Jemkala to keep in a safe place so the tribe would not be tempted to go to war with the whites.” He opens the case beside him and he lifts out some padding, after a few more seconds his right hand is lifting a nulla nulla, an Aboriginal war club, with intricate engraving over most of it. “As an elder authorised to do so I now raise this war club to call the tribe together to fight this war against the state and federal authorities. This time we fight with all we have. I, the Jemkala, call us to war.” All stare when he stands while talking, then he walks over to hand the club to Mr Barnes who raises it high and speaks in their native tongue to repeat what Mack has said.

The media people are all abuzz as an Aboriginal tribe has declared war against the state and federal governments. For some reason there are no questions while they grab the papers and dash out to be first to get the news flash out. Something Mack and Mr Barnes hoped would happen. However, there are lots of phone calls and questions from the media the next day.

As the strategy team intended the media pound the politicians and senior officials all weekend, keeping them well off balance because all of the files they need to see are locked up in government offices until they open on Monday morning and the people who have them locked up are not contactable for the weekend because they’re too low in the pile. The next week the politicians and senior officials work hard to cover their butts on this attempt to build their empires at the expense of the tribe. One of the federal politicians gives out a press release about them having the right to be involved in organisations established by funds of the government. That one is immediately demolished by the media as they’ve checked and show the paperwork to prove Walkers Enterprises have been around longer than the government was providing money to the tribes to set up tribal companies. The following week several of the senior bureaucrats of that minister’s department suddenly resign after being told to do so or face sacking for incompetence for not checking the public records, even after being told those facts in a press release.

The fun is better on the state level when the head of one department is part of a media conference and being hounded by the media where he says, “These people need to have government officials involved in managing a company because they don’t know how to do so properly.” After that mistake on camera the minister is asking for his resignation while they leave the building.

The government lawyers are soon in contact with the Walkers’ lawyers to discuss an out of court settlement. During the week before Christmas an agreement is reached where letters of apology from all of the government agencies and people involved are sent to the Council of Elders and the tribe will stop all but one of their court actions, also a compensation payment of three hundred thousand dollars is made to the tribe to cover all of their costs to date.

The real big win is the last court action before a special federal court where it’s a proven and accepted right of Aboriginal companies to deny the state and federal authorities a look at their books beyond those provided under the laws for all companies. The matter is the start of a campaign to end the funding of special Aboriginal services and roll the funds into general services for the whole community to make it clear to all people the Australian Aboriginal peoples are an integral part of the general Australian community and shouldn’t be separated out in any way at all.

A number of politicians at the state and federal level resign soon after this media blunder, including Brian Park’s friend who’d been busy trying to help him get control of the Sandy Knoll Farm forest area. His party leadership jumps on him for being the one to initiate this major blunder caused because no one expected the tribe to go on the attack so fast or to bring the media into it at all, which was very stupid of them to think so.

Mack’s appearance in the news is much discussed at school and he’s a major school celebrity for the last few weeks of school. There’s also some interesting discussions about him being a tribal elder.

The Summer Holidays

Jess and Ann finish school a little before Mack does. On the Friday of the week before Mack finishes school they take the bus to Queanbeyan to be with Mack for the holidays. They go by bus because they don’t want to drive the old ute that far and back, and it’ll be of more use to the family left at the farm for trips into town etc. during the time they’re away.

Mack picks them up from the Jolimont Centre and they stop for KFC on the way home. They eat their meal in the store and take some extras home with them. The stay is short while he introduces the girls to John and Helen before going to the hotel Mack booked them into as the kids met the girls at the farm. He helps them sign in on his debit card and they drive Mack back home so they can have the Yukon to get about in.

On the Saturday morning the girls pick Mack and the Thomas kids up early and they go visit Tanya’s family for a short while when they pick her up. The morning is spent shopping with all of the kids as they go in the Yukon. They hit one of the large malls and split into groups of two or three, regroup for a mid-morning snack, then they head out in a different mix of groups and repeat at lunchtime. The changes in groups makes the Christmas shopping easier to keep details of purchases secret from the recipients while giving buyers help to pick gift items. Mid-afternoon they head home to wrap the presents in their own rooms. Saturday night is dinner out and a film.

Sunday is church, with an afternoon and evening of playing board games while they talk about life and many other things.

The time to Christmas is spent visiting many of the tourist spots in the area plus a few day trips to nearby tourist spots with all of the kids going in the Yukon. Mack, Jess, and Ann spend Christmas with the Thomas family in the morning, lunch with the Steins, and dinner with the Lukovic family. The day after Boxing Day the kids get in the Yukon and drive to Sandy Knoll Village for the rest of the summer holidays.

The Farm

Some of the surprises for Mack are the changes at Sandy Knoll Farm as Ann and Jess hadn’t said anything and Mack expected the elders to do what was already set out, but they’ve completed everything in the plan and now they’ve only the unstated community building where the gym is likely to go. They even did the row of large houses across the bottom of the village, that wasn’t expected as the slabs weren’t in on the last trip.

Ann is driving when they arrive and she parks in front of the large house Mack did most of the building of. Ma Hanson walks out and greats them while they get out of the car. Before Mack can say a word she says, “Mack, Jess, Ann, there’s been a few changes in the last two weeks. As you can see, Mack, all of the houses are now finished. Marker and his family have moved into the new eight bedroom house nearest the dam. Hammer and his family are now back in the first five bedroom house. You’re in the master bedroom here with Jess and Ann while I’m in the other main bedroom here. There’s a few older kids living in some of the bedrooms near me because they’re going to school at Wood Valley while their parents are working down in Melbourne. The two rooms near yours are set up for guests. Diane and Tanya will stay here while Mary and James will stay with Marker and his family.”

Mack asks, “Why all the changes, Ma?”

“To get you set up in your long-term housing for when you return from the university. Now it’ll be your own permanent place for you to stay in during the holidays.”