The University of the South Pacific’s (USP) Vice-Chancellor and President Professor Pal Ahluwalia recently participated in an editorial titled ‘The voice referendum: Australia’s time to right a wrong’.
Through the editorial, Professor Ahluwalia explained that ‘The voice referendum’ focuses on recognising the indigenous people of Australia and advocating for indigeneity and its importance in the larger context of Australia and, to an extent, the Pacific.
This referendum seeks to ‘recognise the original inhabitants of Australia’ and propose a law ‘to alter the Constitution to recognise the First Peoples of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.’
It comes on the cusp of the Australian polls this Saturday (October 14, 2023) that have been dubbed a ‘once in a generation referendum to redress the past’.
According to Professor Ahluwalia, the voice referendum is much more than atonement for the polices of the last 40years. It represents the opportunity to right a wrong that has been perpetrated upon the original inhabitants who have endured the worst excesses of colonial rule and brutal policies aimed at assimilation.”
You can read more about it here: https://doi.org/10.1080/13504630.2023.2264641
