“We, the Aboriginal Australians, were swept under the carpet so often”

Ms Kaliopi Koumalatsos is a proud Wergaia, Wemba Wemba artist with Greek heritage. She talks to SBS Greek about the recent peaceful protests and marches in Australian cities demonstrating against racism and violence towards Aboriginal people.

Greek-Aboriginal artist Kelly Koumalatsos. Source: AAP/Koorie Art Show

Ms Kaliopi Koumalatsos’ father, Dimitrios, migrated in Australia from the Greek island of Samos and her mother was a Wergaia Wemba-Wemba woman, an Aboriginal Australian group in north-western Victoria. 

She told SBS Greek that fifteen years ago her mother told her about the protests in the USA.

“It is so heartbreaking to see what’s happening in America. It has been inevitable because of the deaths at the hands of the police. I heard my mother saying fifteen years ago that there will be civil rights wars in America because of the general between black and white people. It just seems to get gone worse.”

“I am thankful that the protests here were peaceful, the people did go out and demonstrated for Americans and particularly for Aboriginal people”, she says for the protests in Australian soil.

Ms Koumalatsos says that the Royal Commotion for Aboriginal Deaths in Custody took place a long time ago, but the recommendations still have not been applied to Australians and the Australian incarcerated procedures.

“We had an Aboriginal woman who died in a police jail and her case has still gone on. And there are so many others. That’s what happens to people when you take their land, you forbite them from practicing their language and culture”.

Ms Koumalatsos points out that in certain places and times in Australia, it would be illegal for Aboriginal people to own a property.

“And then”, she told SBS Greek, “you get a lot of Aboriginal people with a lot of issues because for more than two centuries they been denied basic human rights. They were even forbidden to see their own family and forced into places like concentration camps. They were not given any other choice. They had to stay in those compounds, and they were often not allowed to see their immediate or extended family. That was by law and they would have punished.”

The Aboriginal Greek artist believes that the problems for Aboriginal people in Australia remain although there have been some small gains.

“I guess the fact that I am talking to you on a Greek radio program shows that we have developed some strong connections, ethically and morally. The fact that you are interested in talking to me as a Greek Aboriginal person shows that we have come a long way”.

Referring to the criticism about the protests in a time of a pandemic she told SBS Greek: “If I was younger and I didn’t have a medical condition compromising, I would definitely want to be there”.

“I did hear somebody saying on the radio, what if two or three hundred people die. I don’t feel quite like that. I wouldn’t want to see anybody die”.

“We, the Aboriginal Australians, were swept under the carper so often, so it is actually fantastic to see people come out in such hard times and during the pandemic”.

“It is nice that people feel better and stronger, less helpless and less anxious”. 

NOTE: SBS Greek will soon upload the second part of the interview with Aboriginal Greek artist Kelly Koumalatsos, where she talks about her rich heritage and her highly praised art. 

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