Canberra, (Samajweekly) Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has declared that the referendum on the proposed Indigenous Voice to Parliament will go ahead this year.
In a recent speech at the Garma Festival in the Northern Territory (NT), Albanese said there was no guarantee of success for the referendum, but rejected calls to put it off, Xinhua news agency reported.
The referendum will ask Australians to vote yes or no on altering the nation’s constitution to establish the voice, which would advise federal politicians on all matters relating to Indigenous Australians, and formally recognize Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Peoples of Australia.
In order to be successful, more than 50 per cent of Australian voters as well as a majority in at least four out of six states must vote yes in a referendum.
“Today I can promise all of you – and all Australians – there will be no delaying or deferring this referendum,” Albanese told Australia’s largest Indigenous cultural gathering on Saturday.
“In the months ahead, just as we will continue to make it clear what voting Yes will achieve. Australians should be equally clear about what voting No means: it is more of the same. Not only rejecting the opportunity to do better but accepting that what we have is somehow good enough.”
He listed some examples of the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people to show the urgency, including high suicide rate and shocking disease rate.
The statement comes despite support for the “yes” campaign trending downwards in recent months according to some polls.
