Mental Health biggest problem in Aboriginal communities

Aboriginal leaders should be guiding the national summit on the violence in Indigenous communities, rather than being excluded from it by Federal Indigenous Affairs Minister, Mal Brough, said Aboriginal Elder and Health Liaison Officer, Diana Schreider.

Ms Schreider, spends her days dealing face to face with the mental health issues which are at the heart of the violence and substance abuse plaguing Aboriginal communities and is hugely disappointed by the exclusion of Aboriginal leaders from the proposed summit.

“We should have aboriginal leaders going in to problem communities with
non-aboriginal backup, not the other way around” said Ms Schreiber.

Ms Schreider tried to draw attention to the issue of abuse in Aboriginal communities fifteen years ago, and feels the blind eye turned by authorities is “like sitting watching some one get raped”.

“No matter who you are there is no excuse, violence is not in our culture, it is not men’s business, it is the result of depression and alcohol” she said.

The focus on policing was important Ms Schreider felt, however, education, community self esteem and prohibition of alcohol was also part of the solution to the violence.

The media turned its focus on the abuse in Aboriginal communities last week when crown prosecutor for the Northern Territory, Nanette Rogers, publicly voiced her worries about how the problems were being addressed.

Northern Territory Chief Minister Clare Martin was initially reluctant to attend the summit claiming that the Federal Government did not show commitment to previous projects successfully tackling community violence.

In reaction to criticism of his decision to dismiss input directly from the Aboriginal community from the national summit Mr Brough said "Indigenous people have spoken, they have told us what they need. We now, as politicians and as people who run the judicial systems, are the ones who have to step up".

The World Cup debate

“I wana jump in the stadium full of Australians”
Lyrics form the song ‘Green and Gold’, winner of SBS competition: 'A song for the Socceroos'.

Just 19 days from the start of Australia’s second appearance in the World Cup, debate continues over whether the language of football will unite or divide Australians.

Sports and social commentators have revealed conflicting views
in the run up to the World Cup.

Journalist from The Australian, Greg Baum, ignited debate following the Socceroos World Cup Qualifier against Uraguay in November last year, by drawing the link:

“Australians mass with their flags and their anthem at Stadium Australia and
howl at those who are not like us, then at Cronulla Australians mass with their
flags and their anthems and howl at those who are not like us. The comparison is
unavoidable and disturbing”, Mr. Baum reported.

“It might be coincidence that the riots in Cronulla followed so soon after the World Cup qualifier, but it might not”, he said.

Ethnic rivalry has been a long standing problem in Australian Soccer leagues, exemplified last March when violence between Croatian and Serbian supporters of Sydney United and the Bonnyrigg White Eagles broke out at Edensor Park.

One Hundred police attended the disturbance and two were injured in a fight which involved 50 fans.

Football Federation of Australia Chief Executive, John O'Neill said at the time "we'll do whatever we need to do to remedy that problem".

In a recent interview conducted by George Negus on SBS radio Tony Pignata, chief executive of Football Federation Victoria, said “ I think we have turned a corner at a national level, now we have Italians, Greeks, Serbians and Croats sitting next to each other supporting Melbourne Victory”

“At a local level there is some more work to do, it is an education process where we must get across that our game is not to be used for political avenue”, said Mr Pignata.

Founder of the on-line resource for newly arrived immigrants http://www.newcommersnetwork.com.au/, Sue Ellson, commented on the potential of the Socceroos World Cup fame “some research conducted in 2004 showed people in Australia do connect through sport more than other countries”

Sydney's Sudanese Community should SAIL

“We wish that there was room in this country for all the children who are
hurt by war. We wish they could all live here in Australia with us” –
-
Tina, Sudanese refugee living in Melbourne, and member of the Sudanese
Australian Integrated Learning program.

NSW receives the majority of Australia's Sudanese refugees but lags behind Melbourne in active community intergration.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics shows that since 1996 the Sudanese community has been and continues to be the fastest growing ethnic community in Australia.

This growth is sure to continue at a time when two of the three warring parties in Sudan’s conflict cursed region of Darfur have refused to sign a peace plan based on two years of negotiations.

The latest Federal government distribution by State Census published on the Department of Immigration’s website: http://www.immi.gov.au/statistics/stat_info/comm_summ/textversion/sudan.htm States that New South Wales has the largest number of Sudan-born residents.

Sudanese Australian Intergrated Learning or SAIL, a successful educational support system for Sudanese refugees has untill now been unique to Melbounre.

Co founder, Matthew Albert, visited Sydney this week to investigate the possibility of establishing SAIL in Sydney.

SAIL began with students, Anna Grace Hopkins and Matthew Albert, who offered their services as English tutors to a Sudanese family in need.

Since its foundation in 2001 the program has developed and gained strength, students, tutors and positive affirmation from all corners of the community.

SAIL currently operates out of three community centres in Melbourne’s western suburbs and although still based on language, learning feels more like a mass exercise in cross cultural companionship.

A dilapidated church in Footscray is the site of a Saturday morning SAIL meeting.

Parking is an impossibility as people pour in to greet each other in a manor which suggests friendship rather than student teacher relationships.

Confident teenagers catch up on a week apart and younger siblings play and laugh in a way that allows the onlooker to forget about the painfully recent atrocities they may never talk about.

The day’s activities are a loosely based around a schedule but are guided by individual students and tutors synchronizing only for a lunch time feast provided by the SAIL team.

There is a sense of mutual respect as students look to their tutors for guidance while tutors are visibly in ore of the young faces of the Sudanese conflict in which over 180, 000 lives have been lost.

“I sometimes believe that I get more out of the experience than the kids, but I know at the end of the day, when my two girls give me a thankyou hug that they also enjoy the time” said SAIL volunteer, Sharon.

“Volunteering at Sail may prove addictive” joked Ben, another regular member of the SAIL team.

The SAIL website http://home.vicnet.net.au/~sail/ claims “SAIL maintains a regular voluntary staff of 190 giving people, who tutor, mentor, prepare lunch, maintain the library, administer the Program and assist the Sudanese community in any other way they can”