Black Sovereign Movement to campaign against the voice

A black sovereign movement of veteran land rights activists and elders have emerged as vocal opponents of an Indigenous voice to parliament.

A black sovereign movement of veteran land rights activists and elders has emerged as a vocal ­opponent of an Indigenous voice to parliament, and will instead push for the recognition of Indigenous sovereignty and a truth commission.

Independent senator Lidia Thorpe and more than 14 Indigenous activists on the “progressive No” side convened in Canberra on Tuesday to ­announce the campaign, saying the voice had been “constructed by a colonial regime”.

The movement, which ­includes the last surviving founder of the Aboriginal tent ­embassy, Michael Anderson, prominent Walpiri elder Ned Hargraves and Wiradjuri elder and activist Jenny Munro, claims to have hundreds of supporters.

The delegation met Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney, Labor MP Marion Scrymgour and Labor senator Malarndirri McCarthy to discuss their stance, with the movement agreeing to continue dialogue.

Senator Thorpe, who left the Greens earlier this year to devote her efforts to the black sovereign movement, said the voice was a “vehicle for unwanted constitutional recognition”, which was invalid as Indigenous people “never agreed to be governed by the colonial Australian government”.

“Sovereignty has never been ceded, our sovereignty does not coexist with the sovereignty of the crown,” Senator Thorpe said.

“We are the original and only sovereigns of these lands, we are saying no to the referendum and no to the voice.”

Activist Jennetta Quinn-Bates stood with Senator Lidia Thorpe and members of the Blak Sovereign Movement at Parliament House in Canberra to announce their stance on the voice. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Mr Anderson, a celebrated astronomer whose activism has seen him declare himself the leader of the sovereign Euahlayi nation and refuse to pay council rates, produced a blanket and a bag of beads which he offered to King Charles.

“Anthony Albanese, do what you want with them but that’s a gift for the King who has taken our land,” he said. “I don’t know where (Mr Albanese) got that 80 per cent of Aboriginal people support the voice. Linda Burney is the Minister of Aboriginal ­Affairs but she is also a representative of the King of England and she is not our minister.”

Yoorgabilya woman and anti-incarceration advocate Marianne Yoorgabilya Mackay, who ran for an upper house seat in the WA state election for the Socialist Alliance, said the voice was “not reflective of the voices on the ground”.

“I do not want anyone speaking for me and my family, (it’s) tribal boundary law,” she said.

“No one has the right to speak for us because we got our own voices to speak, we don’t need a voice constructed by a colonial regime that fights every day to ­silence it and kill it out.”