This clip shows Yvonne Margarula describing in the Gundjeihmi language how her father, Toby Gangale, and other Mirarr traditional owners felt worn down by negotiations for the Ranger uranium mine on their land at Kakadu in the Northern Territory. Jacqui Katona says the Mirarr people were told they should sacrifice their rights in the interest of national progress. Footage of Gangale and the mine and black-and-white photographs of the negotiations are included. The clip is subtitled and includes music and the repeated sound of a politician’s speech.

Educational value points

• The negotiations referred to in the clip took place in the 1970s between the Mirarr people, the Northern Territory Land Council and the Australian Government and focused only on the terms and conditions under which the Ranger mine would go ahead. Although the site is on Mirarr land, the Mirarr people could not veto the mine because the Government had exempted Ranger from the veto rights given to traditional owners under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1976 (NT).
• The structure of the clip and the choice of audio and images are used to argue that the traditional owners were under relentless pressure to sign the agreement. The photographs selected by the filmmaker depict the owners with downcast heads and even huddled together as if defeated, while in contrast Ian Viner, then minister for Aboriginal Affairs, appears confident. The drone-like music and the monotonous speech reinforce the argument.
• The agreement was signed on 3 November 1978 and Toby Gangale was quoted as saying that he’d finally given up. Traditional owners are responsible for their country – environmentally, culturally and spiritually – and Gangale’s family members, including his daughter Yvonne Margarula, felt that Gangale’s struggle to resist signing the mining agreement dramatically affected his health.
• Margarula, the senior traditional owner of Mirarr country, indicates that by 2002 the Mirarr people had still not seen the promised benefits of uranium mining. Despite assurances of work at the Ranger mine few Mirarr people were employed and poor living conditions in the community have remained largely unchanged since the 1970s. Jacqui Katona commented in 1997: ‘We have no graduates of secondary education, housing is substandard, the vast majority of community is unemployed’ (http://www.greenleft.org.au, 1997).
• An activist, writer and academic, Katona is of the Djok people whose land is within Kakadu National Park. She was invited by Margarula to work on the 1990s campaign to stop the intended Jabiluka mine. As executive officer of the Gundjeihmi Aboriginal Corporation, she represented the Mirarr in negotiations with the Government and Energy Resources of Australia. She and Margarula received the 1999 Goldman Environment Prize for the successful campaign.

A moving account of how Yvonne Margarula’s father’s generation was defeated by the negotiations over their land and eventually succumbed to poor health. Yvonne Margarula is a stoic figure, and one who is committed to her family’s traditions.

Trespass Synopsis

A documentary about Yvonne Margarula and the Mirarr people’s fight against the mining companies.

Trespass is part of the Nganampa Anwernekenhe series produced by Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA) Productions. Nganampa Anwernekenhe means 'ours’ in the Pitjantjatjara and Arrernte lanuages, and the series aims to contribute to the preservation of Indigenous languages and cultures.

Curator's Notes

A documentary that revisits the Mirarr people’s fight against the uranium mines in Jabiluka. The Mirarr people have had to contend with the existence of Ranger Mine since 1982, a mine that has had a profound impact upon the environment as well as the people who live in the area. The area in dispute includes Jabiluka Project as well as Kakadu National Park – owned by the Mirarr Gundjeihmi people. Yvonne Margarula is the senior traditional owner of Jabiluka, and Trespass is about the arrest of Yvonne Margarula for walking on her own land, and her later conviction at Darwin Magistrates Court on 1 September 1998 of trespassing on Energy Resources Australia’s Jabiluka uranium mining lease, an area which lies within her traditional country inside Kakadu National Park.

An earlier documentary, Jabiluka (1997), documented the Mirarr people’s fight against the mine and focussed specifically on the fight against ERA. The importance of being able to pass the land on to their children, as well as the Gundjeihmi language, is at the centre of Trespass. This documentary shows the consequence on the environment of 20 years of the mine, the impact upon the local people’s language and lifestyle, as well as the Mirarr people themselves being labelled as trespassers on their own land.

Trespass uses interview material as well as archival footage of the old people who, worn down by the battle against the mining companies, eventually succumbed to illness then death. It is stated at the end that Yvonne Margarula and the Mirarr people will not give up the fight. Yvonne Margarula is a leader who is determined not to be defeated by the mining giants.

Notes by Romaine Moreton