For Vincent Lingiari's great-granddaughter, every step in the march of yesterday's recreation of the Wave Hill walk-off — a protest which would pave the way for Aboriginal land rights in Australia — was emotionally charged.
"I'm still learning a lot about my great-grandfather, hearing about him makes me really proud, very happy and sometimes emotional because I never really got to met him," Selma Smiler said.
"It wasn't only about Gurindji people, it was about different tribes along with my great-grandfather."
Still walking in the footsteps of her family line, she said she felt like the fight he started wasn't even close to being finished.
"My people, as Aboriginal people, are still fighting that, one day we will get there," she said.
"It will be exactly like what my great-grandfather did, so one day we will get there hopefully."
The walk-off was one of the longest strikes in history, spanning almost a decade.
It began when 200 stockmen and their families walked off Wave Hill Station in the deep Northern Territory outback in 1966 to protest years of exploitation, horrendous living conditions and murder.
A replica green Bedford truck — which was used by unionists during the years of protest to deliver letters and food to the strikers — led the slow march out of the tiny town of Kalkarindji, across a bridge and down dusty unsealed roads.
It's been 56 years since the seminal point in Australian history, but every year the small community — which is the birthplace of the Australian land rights movement — opens to the masses for the annual Freedom Day Festival.
Voice to Parliament on the agenda
This year, organisers estimated around 3,000 people made the pilgrimage for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic.
To many, like Mae Mar Morrison, a signatory on the Uluru Statement of the Heart, the anniversary of the Wave Hill walk-off is not only a time to remember the many sacrifices of the past, but also a time to highlight the lengthy battle ahead, as the country enters a point of reckoning over a Voice to Parliament and treaty.
"We're hoping whatever happens today, whatever outcome we have today, the government will listen," she said.
On the outskirts of Kalkarindji, chairs were haphazardly pulled together under the beating sun for a rare meeting of all four powerful land councils on Thursday.
It was here too that an enshrined Indigenous Voice and treaty were zeroed in on.
Chair of the Central Land Council Robert Hoosan said at the meeting on Gurindji Country, "the birthplace of Land Rights", history was made again when the four councils convened.
Executive Council Members from the Central, Tiwi, Anindilyakwa, and Northern Land Council passed a resolution supporting implementation of the Uluṟu Statment in full and changing the Australian Constitution to enshrine a Voice to Parliament within this term of government.
They also resolved to call on the NT Government to implement a moratorium on remote public housing rent increases until further consultations have occurred on the framework.
"This is important for all Aboriginal people on homelands and for Aboriginal people in the Anindilyakwa region," Mr Thomas Amagula, who is deputy chair of Anindilyakwa Land Council, said.
The fight for land rights continues
Vincent Lingiari's powerful protest, though long and enduring, saw the Gurindji people become the first Aboriginal community to have their land returned by the Commonwealth in 1975.
It paved the way for the Aboriginal Land Rights Act NT – Australia's first piece of legislation which enabled First Nations people to claim land rights for country.
Despite decades passing since these historic moments, many Aboriginal communities are still fighting to reclaim their land, and protect the environment around them.
Australian musician and activist Paul Kelly — who is the headlining act at the festival — said he would have hoped there had been more progress since recording the protest song From Little Things Big Things Grow with Kev Carmody in 1991.
"Songs can only do so much, they are just part of a whole lot of work people do," he said in a quick interview off stage between sound checks.
"They help with that change bit by bit.
"I would have hoped things had [progressed], but I am realistic to know things don't happen very quickly and it's a matter of getting communities, getting power, getting people, getting expertise, getting skilled people to run things themselves."
