Kimberley Appropriate Economics Interim Report - Australian ...

Keynote Address
Wayne Bergmann, Executive Director,
Kimberley Land Council
I would like to start by explaining a little about my personal experiences and beliefs.
As a Nyikina man I have been told the Dreamtime story of the Fitzroy River. We believe, when the world was
soft, a man called Wunyumbu was fishing in a billabong called Mijirayikan (past Liveringa). He used a special
poisonous tree called Majarla to poison the fish to feed his family. While poisoning the fish a huge serpent rose
up, and Wunyumbu speared the serpent and jumped on its back. He rode on the serpent, traveling to Fitzroy
Crossing, creating the Fitzroy River system of plants and animals as he went. All things grow from this creation
of the river. This is the foundation of our identity.
The Fitzroy River is a part of us and we are a part of the Fitzroy. If we look after the Fitzroy, it will look after
us. For me this Roundtable is about the future of the Raparapa, the Fitzroy River. It is time for us to show our
responsibility and look after it for our kids and their kids - all people, black and white.
This spiritual connection to the river and our land can be difficult for non-Aboriginal people to understand. For
over 40 000 years our people have been connected to this river, in ceremony and life and death. It has given
us food to eat, water to drink, it is part of our spiritual beliefs. It makes us strong. Our grandparents and their
grandparents for thousands of years were born, lived and died along this river.
This Fitzroy River is mighty and powerful, we have to treat it with respect. We have a responsibility as
Aboriginal people to do what is right to ensure its values are protected for the future generations.
The law of this river has been passed from generation to generation for 10’s of thousands of years. We must
make sure that the Fitzroy River flows freely and is not interfered with or blocked. All the plants, animals, and
people depend on this river, and not just people who live along the river but also coastal communities. The river
is central to our ecosystem and to our lives.
I would now like to talk more generally about the Aboriginal perspective on development in the Kimberley, and
about this Roundtable.
I would like to acknowledge the role of Environs Kimberley, and the Australian Conservation Foundation,
who together with the Kimberley Land Council, have put the Roundtable together. This is the result of an
agreement made between the three organisations when the cotton proposals were still being pushed onto the
Kimberley. Well, we beat them!
I would also like to acknowledge all the people who have made such a great effort to travel here, from each end
of the Kimberly Kununurra in the north, and Bidyadanga in the south, and around the world, from Canada,
Switzerland. All your contributions to this Roundtable are very much appreciated. And when need help from all
people.
It’s fantastic to see that this Roundtable is very much a community driven process. Its not something other
people have told us we should do, we have received only a small amount of Government funding for the
meeting. This is good. It means we own the Roundtable – it is for us and about us.
There have been other talks about the future of the Kimberley, such as the Our Place, Our Future conference in
Broome in 1996(?), and the Bungaran meeting in 2004. Crocodile hole report (1992). This Roundtable builds
on those earlier successes.
At the end of this Roundtable, we expect to have a clear Statement from you all about how you think
development in the Kimberley should proceed. This will be used to put forward our views to those who think
they can make decisions for us, showing them that we have our own ideas, and that we are pretty serious
about controlling our own future. All the things you discuss during the next couple of days will feed into that
statement.
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