Central Land Council

The Land is Always Alive

The Luritja Land Association

In October 1974 a number of Luritja families, whose traditional land lies north-east of Uluru, formed the Luritja Land Association to press their claims for their country. They were particularly interseted in land covered by two pastoral leases: Tempe Downs and Middleton ponds.

Kunmanara Breadon first asked the Department of Aboriginal Affairs to buy Tempe Downs for the Luritja in 1973 and in the years that followed approaches were made to five different ministers for Aboriginal Affairs. In the mid-70s Mr Breadon's family and another group led by Sid Coulthard moved onto Tempe Downs and Middleton Ponds without title despite the opposition and intimidation of pastoralists and managers.

n 1974 the families applied to lease an area south of Tempe Downs but ere told that the lands was 'unsuitable for any pastoral pursuits'. The area was at first part of the Ayres Rock (Uluru) land claim but later became part of the Lake Amadeus/Luritja land claim. After that claim was lodged the Northern Territory Governmen 'leased' the area to commercial operators, and although the lease was later declared invalid by the High Court, the Government's action led to long and complicated legal actions which are still preventing the area from being returned to the traditional landowners. In 1983 part of Tempe Downs was acquired by the Northern Territory Government to create Kings Canyon National Park. Kings Canyon, which the Luritja call Watarrka, is a part of an area of great significance to the traditional landowners and they argued strongly that they should own the land and jointly manage the Park. Instead the traditional landowners were only given an advisory role by the government.

In 1983 Ben Clyne, one of the founding members of the Luritja Land Association summed up the frustration that he and others felt. For ten years we've been asking quietly, 'Can we have some land? here? here? or where? And all the time it It's the same. They say 'No you can't have it'. This time we're told it's for tourists. Before it was for cattle All the time it's the same. What is more important, human beings or birds? Might be Aboriginal people are more important, or is it birds and lizards? We're not against tourists, not trying to stop them, but they just come and go away again. We want to go and stop there, to look after our country forever.

After twenty years of quietly asking, the Luritja people finally won their fight. In December 1993 they purchased Tempe Downs and Middleton Ponds with ATSIC funding and lodged a land claim to secure their title to the land.