Resistance fighter wins international environmental prize

Rudi Maxwel |
April 29, 2024

Fighting billionaires and their coal mine proposals may not be the typical way to spend your youth – but Murrawah Johnson comes from a long line of resistance fighters.

Ms Johnson, a Wirdi woman from the Burra Gubba nation in central Queensland, has been recognized with the Goldman Environment Prize, a major international award for grassroots activism that will be announced at a ceremony in San Francisco on Tuesday.

“Having a strong Indigenous cultural identity is actually my superpower in navigating this world and really finding my place in the colonial apparatus that is Australia,” Ms Johnson said.

“I come from a long line of resistance fighters who have been incredibly resilient in the face of the colonial project.”

She first began speaking publicly against Adani’s (now Bravus in Australia) Carmichael coal mine in the land of her people after her parents tapped her on the shoulder when she was just a teenager.

The Wangan-Jagalingou battle against Adani pitted Ms Johnson, her uncle Adrian Burragubba and other traditional owners against the powerful multinational founded by Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, which was at odds with both the Queensland government as the federal government.

Between 2012 and March 2016, Wangan and Jagalingou people voted against signing an indigenous land use agreement with Adani in three separate meetings.

A fourth meeting in April 2016 voted 294 to one in favor of a land use agreement, with some traditional owners protesting outside and others reportedly refusing entry.

Members of the native title claims group who boycotted the meeting say it was packed with people who had no right to vote and that permission should not have been granted.

However, it was approved and has since survived numerous legal challenges involving Ms Johnson – and also caused huge divisions between family members and the bankrupt Mr Burragubba.

“I was depressed about that for eight years, but what are you going to do?” she said.

In 2017, the Labor-backed federal coalition government amended the Native Title Act to allow a majority of named claimants to sign a native land use agreement, whereas previously the law required the agreement to be unanimous – which is the case with the Wangan and Jagalingou people used to be. also called Clermont-Belyando Area Native Title Claim Group) this would demonstrably not have been the case.

Then in 2019, the Queensland Labor government destroyed native title to 1385 hectares of Wangan and Jagalingou land without any public notice, paving the way for the coal mine.

“As a young person you feel powerless and you really start to open your eyes to the fact that there is a conspiracy going on that is working against your people, with First Nations people always being some kind of collateral,” Ms Johnson said.

“Against those in power, the state apparatus, we are still fighting the doctrine of Terra Nullius (land that belongs to no one) and so it is difficult not to be heartbroken, especially as we deal with case after case.”

Taking the lessons from the losses and the knowledge passed on by her elders, in 2020 she led Youth Verdict’s challenge to the proposed Galilee Coal Project in the Queensland Land Court on human rights grounds, fighting billionaire Clive’s Waratah Coal company Palmer.

And this time they won, with the court delivering a landmark climate change ruling in 2022, finding that Waratah Coal’s $6.5 billion Galilee project would restrict certain rights, including the right to life and cultural rights of First Nations peoples.

MONKEY