January 26 is a hugely significant date for this land’s Indigenous population. However, it’s not a time for celebration.
Survival day. Invasion day. Day of mourning. These are the three main nicknames First Nations people have for January 26. It’s the anniversary of the First Fleet’s arrival and the commencement of British colonial rule. For Indigenous Australians, it’s the painful anniversary of the dispossession of their land through genocide.
Invasion Day rallies have been drawing increasingly bigger crowds across the country in recent years. Tens of thousands marched through central Melbourne on January 26, 2019. Crowds of a similar size hit the streets in the other capital cities.
Big numbers are expected again this year and rally organisers are asking their non-Indigenous allies to “pay the rent.”
“Australia is 250 years in arrears,” Invasion Day rally organiser Tarneen Onus-Williams told The Age. “We deserve to get the money that we need, the resources to make sure we are looked after and not living in poverty.”
Greens politician Lidia Thorpe – the first Indigenous woman elected to the Parliament of Victoria – spoke to Triple R’s Breakfasters about the concept.
“The trauma that we do carry with us each and every day… is exacerbated particularly at this time of year,” said Thorpe. “[Pay the rent is] a form of reparations… Australia has not reparated the first people of these lands for atrocities that happened against us.”
Watch: Lidia Thorpe talks the hard truths of Invasion Day
Thorpe launched the Invasion Day Dawn Service in Melbourne’s Kings Domain Resting Place last year. Nearly 700 people attended, which has inspired January 26 dawn services in Tasmania and Queensland this year.
“We have a beautiful ceremony performed by traditional owners,” Thorpe said of the event. “[Everybody hears] of the mass murders that occurred 200 years ago. We read out the many, many massacres around Victoria.
“It’s almost comforting for Aboriginal people to have non-Aboriginal people stand alongside us on this day of mourning, which William Cooper called for in 1938.”
Invasion Day rallies and events around the country this weekend
Sydney
Invasion Day Rally: 11am at Hyde Park South. More information here.
Melbourne
Invasion Day Dawn Service: 5:30am at Kings Domain Resting Place. More information is available here.
Invasion Day Rally: 11am at Parliament House. More information here.
Adelaide
Survival Day 2020: Concert at the Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute from 1-6pm. More information here.
Perth
Invasion Day Rally: Forest Place, Wellington Street from 12pm (there’s a booking complication so it might move to Yagan Square.) More information here.
Brisbane
Invasion Day Rally: 10am at Queens Garden. More information here.
Canberra
Survival Day March: Veterans Park at 11am for an 11.30am start. More info here.
Darwin
Always Was, Always Will Be at Civic Park in Darwin from 11.30am. More information here.
Hobart
Change the Date Rally: Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre (TAC), Elizabeth St at 11am. More information here.
