The Wire

It began with a letter in the Koori Mail newspaper, from Murri woman Jacinta Allison, who is married to an Apache and lives on the San Carlos reservation in Arizona. With the Rio Tinto Kennecott Mining company placing pressure on Apaches to allow mining exploration on traditional lands, Jacinta was seeking information and experiences from Indigenous Australians who had prior dealings with the mining giant. Jacinta and Brad Allison then set about telling Apaches about the past experience of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders from Weipa and Mapoon in far north Queensland and parts of Western Australia – fearing the land, water, flora and fauna would be poisoned by the mining process. But a surprise vote by the Apache Council made a decision to cut off talks with Rio Tinto, in the middle of community consultations. The methods employed by Rio Tinto must be called into question, after it was revealed they had brought an Aboriginal woman from Australia, to influence the Allisons to stop talking against the mining plan.