Voices of Goolarabooloo

January 3, 2018

Today, Magali and I returned to the Goolarabooloo Millibinyarri Aboriginal community which is located only 12 kilometres north of Broome central,  fresh from recent rains in Mankala season - http://www.goolarabooloo.org.au/six_seasons.html

Photo: Alexander Hayes - Phillip Roe giving feedback on the trailer

Photo: Alexander Hayes - Phillip Roe giving feedback on the trailer

We sat with Phillip Roe, Grandson of the late Paddy Roe (Lulu) and discussed the final points Phillip wanted included in the 'Voices Of Goolarabooloo' documentary trailer we are releasing today. The trailer features Jeannie Warbie, Senior Nyikina Traditional Owner and also Phillip Roe, Goolarabooloo Law Boss and Traditional Custodian as well as Frans Hoogland, environmentalist, community spokesperson and mediator.

Photo: Alexander Hayes - (l) Jeannie Warbie & (R) Phillip Roe

Photo: Alexander Hayes - (l) Jeannie Warbie & (R) Phillip Roe

A renewed fight to protect country, maintain law and culture in the face of rampant economic development which threatens and destroys the natural environment forms the central theme to this documentary to be released in late 2018 by Ngikalikarra Media. The trailer contains the key messages that the Goolarabooloo community have lived out through colonisation, forced removal of children, massacres and incarceration of Aboriginal Goolarabooloo people over 223 years.

Photo: Alexander Hayes - (L) Phillip Roe, (C) Jeannie Warbie, (R) Magali McDuffie at Walmadan (James Price Point)

Photo: Alexander Hayes - (L) Phillip Roe, (C) Jeannie Warbie, (R) Magali McDuffie at Walmadan (James Price Point)

Both Phillip Row and Frans Hoogland speak of the failure of native title, the greed and corruption within land councils and the blatant disregard by a few individuals as they step outside of Law to the detriment of themselves and their immediate Families. With mineral sands, natural gas, fracking and other non-conventional mining international consortia pressuring the Aboriginal communities into non-veto positions, the federal and state governments using the instrument of native title are causing massive divides between traditionally harmonious people according to Roe.

Photo: Alexander Hayes - Quondong Point, Western Australia

Photo: Alexander Hayes - Quondong Point, Western Australia

Frans Hoogland provides the fullest account of Liyan and the Bugarregarre, the core to Aboriginality and Law, culture as the main thread in this trailer, with Jeannie Warbie and Phillip Roe providing context and the contemporaneous challenges they face.

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