Australians Reject Indigenous Equity in Racist Vote Outcome

Australians predominantly voted against a proposed constitutional change aimed at acknowledging the nation’s Indigenous populations and giving them a consultative role, termed “Voice,” in Parliament. Despite polls predicting the outcome, the decisive rejection was deeply disheartening for many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, who viewed the referendum as a chance for Australia to move beyond its colonial and prejudiced history.

The envisioned “Voice” was designed as a moderate initiative to offer advice to Parliament on matters pertinent to Indigenous communities, like housing, health, and jobs, without having any enforceable power.

However, opposition forces seemed to have effectively sowed doubts about the proposal’s implications, using the catchphrase “If you don’t know, vote no” and alleging it was polarizing. They also utilized social media platforms to disseminate occasionally misleading or incorrect information. This outcome further posed challenges for the center-left Labor administration and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who had emphasized the referendum following their electoral victory the previous year.

“When you do the hard things, when you aim high, sometimes you fall short,”, Albanese remarked in a sorrowful concession statement. He claimed that false information may have contributed to the outcome and vowed to keep working to better the lot of Indigenous Australians.

“We must take our country beyond this debate without forgetting why we had it in the first place,” he said. “Because too often in the life of our nation and in the political conversation, the disadvantage confronting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people has been relegated to the margins.”

In Australia, passing referendums is notably challenging. They necessitate a “double majority”: a nationwide majority combined with a majority in at least four out of the country’s six states.

This benchmark seemed unattainable just 90 minutes after the first voting stations closed, with media promptly indicating a ‘No’ vote from three states. The ‘Yes’ campaign seemed to be on the back foot in the remaining states as well.

Earlier surveys had suggested that about two-thirds of Australians were in favor of granting an Indigenous “Voice to Parliament.” However, in the wake of a subpar showing in the 2022 elections, leaders from the conservative coalition perceived a chance to undermine Albanese’s standing and bounce back, as per analyst insights.

“It was really done and dusted from that point,” Paul Williams, a political scientist at Brisbane’s Griffith University, agreed and added that the challenging economic environment didn’t help.

Indigenous people have been present in Australia for over 65,000 years, but their way of life was severely harmed when the British came in 1788.Due to foreign diseases and mass murders carried out by White invaders, the Indigenous population fell precipitously during colonial control. Federal and state governments deliberately separated Indigenous children from their families between the mid-1800s and the 1970s in an effort to assimilate them.

Australia has never signed a treaty recognizing the sovereignty of its First Nations people, in contrast to other countries the British colonized like the United States, Canada, and New Zealand.

“I know the last few months have been tough,” Linda Burney, the Minister for Indigenous Australians, told fellow First Nations people. “But be proud of who you are. Be proud of your identity. Be proud of the 65,000 years of history and culture that you are part of, and of your rightful place in this country.”