This is the moment an Aboriginal woman interrupted a cabinet minister on Q&A and told him he had no right to talk about indigenous issues because he’s white.
Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg and shadow treasurer Chris Bowen were debating the idea of a constitutional referendum to create an indigenous voice to parliament when actress Shareena Clanton theatrically put her hands in the air.
‘Can you stop? I’m really sick of non-indigenous peoples making comments about non-indigenous Australia,’ she told the ABC panel show in Sydney on Monday night.
This is the moment an angry Aboriginal woman on Q&A interrupted a cabinet minister and told him to stop talking about indigenous issues
‘We want to be the voice because we are tired of non-indigenous Australia thinking that they know what is good for us and thinking that they can be the voice for Aboriginal Australia.
‘So they should all learn to keep their mouths shut and start engaging Aboriginal Australia into the conversation.’
Ms Clanton became agitated when Mr Frydenberg, a Liberal MP, pointed out that Labor’s indigenous former national president Warren Mundine had objected to the idea of an indigenous parliament as ‘a solution looking for a problem’.
The thespian, who has appeared in Redfern Now and Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries on the ABC, pointed at Mr Frydenberg when he repeated Mr Mundine’s name during her rant.
Shareena Clanton theatrically put her hands in the air as minister Josh Frydenberg and Labor frontbencher Chris Bowen were debating the idea of an indigenous voice to parliament
‘Yourself included,’ she said to the minister before continuing.
‘We have spent 230 years, 230 years of not being included in this constitution.’
The 27-year-old actress argued the Queen, as Australia’s head of state, still owned traditional lands, despite native title provisions that had given Aboriginal people control of their soil.
‘We’re still begging to protect sacred sites that are over 80,000 years old from mining companies, from gas companies,’ she said, punctuating her sentences with theatrical pauses. ‘We want to be the author of our own destinies.’
Chris Bowen looked on with a bemused expression as Ms Canton said she non-indigenous peoples needed to keep their mouths shut
Her passionate comments divided the studio audience, with footage showing many people in the Q&A crowd keeping still as others clapped.
Last year, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Indigenous Affairs Minister Nigel Scullion and former attorney-general George Brandis rejected the Referendum Council’s proposal for a referendum to establish an indigenous ‘Voice to Parliament’.
The council wanted indigenous people to have a voice about legislation and policies, even though the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission was abolished in 2004 by the former Howard government over governance issues.