December 6:
“…asked me the extent of the corruption…”
The South Australian minister for Aboriginal affairs (CLP) flew in, unannounced, on a chartered aircraft, accompanied by his entourage, including two ALP politicians. I bundled them unceremoniously on the back of a Toyota trayback and gave them a very hot and dusty guided tour of the settlement and its surrounding “attractions,” such as the improvised rubbish dump, the houses trashed by sniffers, the houses deliberately set on fire. One of the Liberals was, in his real life, an Adelaide lawyer. He was very vocal, very critical, very outraged. He asked me the extent of the corruption. I told him straight, no holds barred. He and the other pollies were obviously shocked. Good! So they should be! The lawyer asked me if I would please document the corruption, write it all down in detail, naming names. I agreed. He left me his phone and fax numbers all over Adelaide, insisting I call him day or night if the need arose. I spent many nights documenting the mess on paper. When he received it, and had read the particulars, he rang to say he was flying off to Canberra on the morrow to broach the matter with the Federal Aboriginal minister. Weeks later, I had heard nothing of the visit, so I wrote to ask the result. Back came the response: “It’s too politically sensitive. We can’t do anything about it.”
God save us from our leaders!
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