Treaty of Union between Sovereign First Nations of the Murray-Darling Basin-
Channel: Sovereign Union
Date: 2017-05-12

Fred Hooper, Murrawarri Nation
Ghillar, Michael Anderson, Euahlayi Nation
Cheryl Buchanan, Gwamu/KoomaNation speak after the signing of the Multilateral Treaty.

Treaty of Union between Sovereign First Nations of the Murray-Darling Basin.

Yesterday (10 May 2017) was an extremely historic occasion with the signing of the Treaty of Union between Sovereign First Nations of the Murray-Darling Basin.

The Commonwealth government, with the aid of 'native' collaborators altered the gains, which were hard fought and won by the youth of the 1970s, which saw us achieve a form of Land Rights, albeit through a warrior called Eddie Mabo. The win in Mabo shocked the Australian nation to its foundation, but the issue of ownership by Sovereign First Nations was never answered, because the question was never asked in the Mabo case.

The questions not attended to were such questions as: Who owns the water? Who owns the natural resources? On the question of sovereignty the High Court correctly ruled that this question is not justiciable within the existing legal system of the occupying power. The one question of continuing sovereignty of Aboriginal/First Nations cannot be dealt with within the Australian legal or political system for that matter.

For a long time now Aboriginal people have reached the conclusion that the time has come when we must fight for the ownership of the natural resources, where we assert 'permanent sovereignty over natural resources' which includes water.

In the southern part of the Murray-Darling Basin the First Nations in Victorian, South Australia and Central Southern New South Wales formed a body corporate themselves called MILDRIN, Murray Lower Darling River - Indigenous Nations, more than a decade ago to negotiate and demand their sovereign entitlements to the waters of all the rivers and intersecting streams that flow through their Nations.
Eight years ago First Nations of the Northern part of the Murray-Darling Basin in southern Queensland and northern and western New South Wales formed a united group called the Northern Basin Aboriginal Nations (NBAN). Its primary functions were to assert permanent sovereignty over waters and natural resources within the northern part of the Murray-Darling Basin.