- All six states reject Voice proposal and TV network project
- Nationally, 60% of voters reject the proposal
- Rejections are seen as a setback for reconciliation
SYDNEY, Oct 14 (Portal) – Australia on Saturday firmly rejected a proposal to recognize indigenous peoples in the constitution, in a major setback to the country’s efforts to reconcile with its indigenous peoples.
Australians had to vote “yes” or “no” in the referendum, the first in almost a quarter of a century, on the question of whether the constitution should be changed to protect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples by creating an indigenous constitution Advisory body to recognize the “voice to Parliament”.
Statewide, nearly 70% of votes were counted, with the “no” vote leading to a “yes” vote of 60% to 40%. Australia’s ABC and other television networks have predicted that a majority of voters in all six Australian states would vote against changing the 122-year-old constitution.
A successful referendum requires at least four of the six yes votes and a national majority.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese acknowledged it was not the outcome he had hoped for but said the country must seek a new path to reconciliation.
“Our nation’s path to reconciliation has often been arduous,” Albanese said in a televised news conference.
“Tonight is not the end of the road and certainly not the end of our efforts to bring people together.”
Academics and human rights activists fear that the victory of the “no” camp could set back reconciliation efforts by years.
The “Voice to Parliament” was proposed in the “Uluru Statement from the Heart,” a 2017 document written by Indigenous leaders that sets out a roadmap for reconciliation with the greater Australia.
Australia’s Indigenous citizens, who make up 3.8% of the country’s 26 million population, have inhabited the country for about 60,000 years but are not mentioned in the constitution and are, by most socioeconomic measures, the most disadvantaged people in the country.
Supporters of the proposal believed that enshrining an Indigenous voice in the Constitution would unite Australia and usher in a new era with its Indigenous peoples.
Many Indigenous people supported the change, but some said it distracted from achieving practical and positive results.
The political opposition criticized the measure, saying it was divisive, ineffective and would slow down the government’s decision-making.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney leave the country after making a statement on the vote referendum result at Parliament House in Canberra on October 14, 2023. AAP Image/Mick Tsikas acquire license rights via Portal
“I’m devastated,” Indigenous leader and prominent Yes activist Thomas Mayo said on ABC News.
“We need a voice. We need this structural change.”
A setback for Albanese
Referendums are difficult to pass in Australia, with only eight of 44 successful since the country’s founding in 1901. This is the first referendum in Australia since voters rejected a proposal to create a republic almost a quarter of a century ago.
In 1967, a referendum to count Aboriginal people as part of the Australian population was a resounding success with bipartisan political support.
However, this year’s referendum has failed to attract unified support, with leaders of the major conservative parties calling for a “no” vote.
No referendum has been held in Australia without cross-party support.
The Voice has been a key part of Prime Minister Albanese’s tenure and a failure in the referendum would be his biggest setback since coming to power in May last year, according to political analysts.
Opposition leader Peter Dutton criticized Albanese for holding a referendum “that Australia didn’t need to have”.
“The proposal and the process should have been aimed at uniting Australians, not at dividing us,” he told a news conference after the result was announced on Saturday.
A misinformation campaign spread across social media also fueled fears that the Voice – a purely advisory body – would become a third chamber of Parliament, leading to more federal aid to Aboriginal people and more disputes between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people.
Albanese also criticized some sections of the media which he said had distracted the referendum debate from the core issues.
“We had discussions, including in the media represented in this room, about a number of things that had nothing to do with what was on the ballot tonight,” Albanese said.
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Additional reporting by Kirsty Needham, Alasdair Pal and John Mair in Sydney; Writing by Praveen Menon; Edited by William Mallard, Clarence Fernandez and Edmund Klamann
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