Aboriginal gang violence erupts

[Christina Marie]

Thursday, May 25, 2006

Aboriginal gang violence erupts
Australians focus on poverty, plight of island's natives

By ROD MCGUIRK
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

CANBERRA, Australia -- Gang violence that is tearing apart a remote indigenous community in northern Australia has focused attention on the shocking state of many Aboriginal families' lives.

In Wadeye, a former Roman Catholic Church mission of 2,500 Aborigines, hundreds have fled their homes to escape marauding Aboriginal gangs toting spears, crowbars and machetes.

"It's been going on for years," Tobias Marrumbu, a 22-year-old member of the Evil Warriors gang, said Wednesday in a telephone interview.

"It started because a young man got shot a couple of years ago and (rival gang Judas Priest) want to kill one of ours -- it's payback."

Violence has intensified in recent months, and on Saturday gang members torched cars and burned about 20 houses. Local authorities are considering the drastic step of evacuating hundreds of people living in makeshift refugee camps, but the roads are blocked because of heavy seasonal rains.

Wadeye is 155 miles southwest of Darwin in the Northern Territory, just inland from Joseph Bonaparte Gulf. The territory is the size of France, Italy and Spain combined, and the Australian Bureau of Statistics says nearly 25 percent of the people are of indigenous origin.

Terry Bullimore, executive director of the Wadeye Community Council, said as many as 300 Aborigines might need to be evacuated.

Many Aboriginal communities are in remote parts of the Outback, such as Wadeye, or on the fringes of cities. Although violence is endemic in many of those communities, it rarely makes the front page of metropolitan newspapers as the Wadeye gang war did this week.

Many of Australia's more than 400,000 Aborigines live in conditions of poverty commonly found in developing countries. Among Australia's 20 million people, they have the highest rates of infant mortality, preventable disease, unemployment and incarceration. On average, they die more than 20 years younger than other Australians.



The federal government has responded by calling for a June summit of Australian state and territory leaders to discuss solutions to the violence and child abuse plaguing Aboriginal families.

The center-right government of Prime Minister John Howard says Aborigines should be treated equally before the law and that their unique culture should not allow them to carry out violent acts in their communities with impunity.

The current practice of reduced sentences for Aboriginal men who sexually assault women promised to them as a wife under traditional law, or for carrying out traditional corporal punishments, only adds to the problem of violence against women and children, the government has said.

"This government believes very strongly in protecting innocent children and women in Aboriginal communities and we will not let political correctness get in the way of that," Acting Prime Minister Peter Costello told Parliament Wednesday.

That argument was backed by Nanette Rogers, a prosecutor from the violence-plagued central Australian city of Alice Springs. She made headlines last week when she said Aboriginal men were using traditional law as an excuse to rape women and girls and sexually abuse children.

But legal groups and two state governments with the largest Aboriginal populations have rejected the argument put forth by Costello.

The opposition Labor party also has blamed insufficient housing for unrest among Aborigines. Wadeye has fewer than 150 houses for its 2,500 people.


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