MEDIA RELEASE

5 November 2021

On behalf of the Severn River, Ngarabal and Kwiambal Aboriginal Corporation (SRNKAC), we are pleased with yesterday's media release from the NSW Greens Senator, Cate Feahrmann, stating the "NSW Govt. has announced the end to the destructive Mole River Dam project."

In May this year, Senator Feahrmann chaired the NSW Government’s Senate Inquiry into Rationale For, and Impacts of, New Dams and Other Water Infrastructure In NSW, (Inquiry) where the SRNKAC gave evidence. Our perceived concerns included:

1.     Issues with the flawed consultation process.

2.     Truth-telling, in the 1840s, there was a massacre on the Mole River, and our ancestors should be in peace. 

3.     Impacts on the Aboriginal reserve on the dam imprint. In the late 1890s, our ancestor Mole River Jacky had the reserve designated to his family. Jacky's internment is near the reserve. His remains would have been resumed for the dam - against our Ngarabal laws.

4.     Impacts on our culture, heritage and the local biome, including impacts on the Dumaresq River.

Quoting my statement at the Inquiry, if the "dam gets built—then you (the NSW Government) have killed our Dreamtime. You have killed my walking track. You have killed all my storylines, my dance lines—you killed them all. So to this day we're still getting killed, no matter which way you look at it." We saw this dam as ethnocide.

We thank our supporters, Senator Feahrmann, for chairing the inquiry. The Greens political party. The Senators who participated in the Inquiry. The Moombahlene Local Aboriginal Land Council. The Ngarabal and other Elders and the community in Inverell; Tenterfield and the outlying areas. Additionally, the Mole River Dam Alliance.

Uncle Theo Wright

Ngarabal Elder

Chairperson, Severn River, Ngarabal and Kwiambal Aboriginal Corporation