While the Gillard government has abandoned offshore processing, it must also scrap mandatory detention, urged a rally and exhibition at Sydney University last Wednesday.
The Anti-Racism Collective fitted a shipping container with metal bunk beds as part of the Verge Festival’s UnContainable project to imitate the conditions of detention centres in which 6000 asylum seekers currently live in Australia.
Former detainee Zal Shahbazi spoke about his four years and two months in immigration facilities, including Curtin in Western Australia, which houses asylum seekers in converted shipping containers. Mr Shahbazi said his experiences, which include 11 hunger strikes and six months in isolation, continue to affect his ability to function in everyday life.
Mr Shabazi identified the main issue with mandatory detention as the government’s decision to outsource control of facilities to private company Serco. “I liked prison better than detention,” Mr Shahbazi told the City Hub. “At least there were rules and regulations while in the detention centre there were none. The officers would all say different things and they bashed me five times but the Australian government can’t touch them … everybody talks about peace and democracy in the Middle East but what about Australia?”
Australia’s involvement in US led wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq also makes the mandatory detention of men, women and children seeking asylum from war torn countries hypocritical Mr Shahbazi said. He then described the chronic suffering and anxiety of one Afghan father waiting in Villawood after his two sons were murdered by the Taliban. With 35 million asylum seekers worldwide, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has asked the Australian government to increase its humanitarian intake.
Greens MP Lee Rhiannon highlighted the timeliness of the asylum seeker issue as the tenth anniversary of the 2001 Tampa affair approaches, and raised concerns over the merging immigration policies of Labor and Liberal parties. “Last week was a fantastic outcome at the High Court but there is still far to go,” Ms Rhiannon said.
“But we are now seeing Labor side with Tony Abbott to come up with a new law to allow the offshore processing of refugees.” The alliance between Labor and Liberal also contradicts a recent Neilsen poll which found 53 per cent of Australians believe asylum seekers should be processed onshore.
The Anti Racism Collective is organising a protest against mandatory detention outside Immigration Minister Chris Bowen’s electorate office in Fairfield on Saturday September 17 at 11 am. More information: www.refugeeaction.org.au
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