Peacekeepers can help fix crime problems in NT remote communities

East Arnhem Land should become the site of a move towards investing in community based peacekeepers, so communities can draw on the authority that already exists within them for solving conflict and creating order, writes Mulka MLA YINGIYA GUYULA.

Indigenous communities have an opportunity to implement local solutions that create long-lasting change, writes Mulka MLA Yingiya Guyula.

MINISTER Wyatt’s clear call to keep Indigenous kids out of jail brings hope.

It also comes at a time when the Minister has announced that significant commonwealth funding for remote policing is coming to an end.

This presents an opportunity to turn our attention to our communities and implement local solutions that create long-lasting change.

In East Arnhem Land I want to see a move towards investing in community based peacekeepers, so we can draw on the authority that already exists in our communities for solving conflict and creating order.

The current discussion by NT government and CLP opposition about reversing the bail laws worries and frightens me.

We know that it is Aboriginal children who will be most affected by these changes.

The more contact that our people have with the justice system, the more we see them become hardened and proud of a jailbird status.

Elders want to keep our children away from this system.

Our Yolngu education system, Raypirri, is underpinned by the teaching of self-discipline, care for kin and community, and care for country.

This is how we grow our children.

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Rather than becoming hardened by the system of correctional services, we want our children to become strong future leaders.

All children are born gifted and talented.

The stories that we hear on the news and from politicians about youth crime in the Northern Territory sometimes allows us to forget that these stories are about children.

They are about children who need our support to bring them back onto the pathway where they can discover their talents.

In order to do this, we must look to local communities for solutions.

In East Arnhem Land, gumurr watjarrmirr is a way to describe elders and leaders who intervene in community unrest in order to keep the peace.

The literal translation is gumurr – chest/frontline and watjarr – peace.

I want to see the employment of community leaders and elders to do the work of gumurr watjarrmirr as peacekeepers, who are properly resourced to work with communities and police, to create solutions for our people who need help.

When I stand on the beach in Milingimbi and see a boatload of people heading to court in Ramingining each month, I know that the system is not working and things are only getting worse.

The damage caused by oppressive government policies like the Intervention, the Stronger Futures Policy, Super Shires and Growth Towns has had a devastating impact on our communities.

Mulka MLA Yingiya Guyula, pictured in Darwin. Picture: Amos Aikman

Investment in local peacekeepers is not the only answer – this needs to come with an investment in solving the underlying problems.

We need to see an investment in housing and infrastructure, a genuine two-ways approach to education, small business development, training and job development, a fair and equal approach to funding homeland towns.

We need to see all these things as well as other local solutions.

Our local solutions come from our right to self-determination and we need to have the current discussion about youth crime within the context of self-determination and recognising the authority of our people.

The ongoing undermining of our authority is one of the underlying reasons for youth crime.

Our young people do not see our culture and our elders being respected by government, this example has contributed to their loss of identity and hope.

If all levels of government and our elders can work together we will get outcomes that change the future of our communities and the future of our children.

We are looking for real partnership based on equality and two-ways.

We hear these phrases so often – support for diversity, support for First Nations, support for protecting the oldest culture in the world – but we rarely see it.

We see a one-way approach that clearly is imprisoning Aboriginal people and growing up our kids with no future.

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Right now there is an opportunity for change and an opportunity for children to find out who they are and grow their gifts and talents.

Our communities must do this work with proper support and resources for local solutions, rather than continuing under a failing system.

Yingiya Guyula is the Member for Mulka.