Wantok 2012 Inaugural Australian South Sea Islanders National Conference (ASSI.PJ)

The Australian South Sea Islanders (Port Jackson) Limited (ASSI.PJ) interim national body acknowledges and believes in the unique ways that Australians of South Sea Islander heritage contribute to the broader Australian society. This contribution reflects our South Sea Islander heritage and will be recognised by all Australians because we are of: One Spirit; One Mind; One Voice -- commonly seeking prosperity based on respect. Last April 2012, a major conference was held in Bundaberg, Queensland to unite the descendants of these labourers, who came mainly from the New Hebrides and Solomon Islands, but also from Fiji, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea and many other locations in the region. The Wantok 2012 conference in Bundaberg brought together the descendants of those who remained -- known today as Australian South Sea Islanders, or ASSI -- from around Australia, as well as a large delegation of customary leaders and descendants' families from Vanuatu led by MPs Ralph Regenvanu and Abel David. The conference featured a moving reconciliation ceremony, as chiefs from Vanuatu revealed the hidden history of past atrocities and sought to rebuild links across Oceania. 2012 celebrates the 1992 inquiry by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission. The Wantok 2012 conference came on the twentieth anniversary of the inquiry's report, which recommended that South Sea Islanders be formally recognised as a distinct disadvantaged group and be given access to health and welfare schemes. Emelda Davis president, believes that it is important to build a national body to link ASSI communities across Australia. "As it is now, we're fragmented with individual voices and the governments aren't listening," she says. "We need a national body so governments will sit up and take notice because they're dealing with a nation. Queensland has been at the forefront but we'll still need a national voice that can give us action in all areas: in the national education curriculum, in health and well-being, in things that will give our youth opportunities." The Australian South Sea Islanders (Port Jackson) Limited (ASSI.PJ) interim national body acknowledges and believes in the unique ways that Australians of South Sea Islander heritage contribute to the broader Australian society. This contribution reflects our South Sea Islander heritage and will be recognised by all Australians because we are of: One Spirit; One Mind; One Voice -- commonly seeking prosperity based on respect. Last April 2012, a major conference was held in Bundaberg, Queensland to unite the descendants of these labourers, who came mainly from the New Hebrides and Solomon Islands, but also from Fiji, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea and many other locations in the region. The Wantok 2012 conference in Bundaberg brought together the descendants of those who remained -- known today as Australian South Sea Islanders, or ASSI -- from around Australia, as well as a large delegation of customary leaders and descendants' families from Vanuatu led by MPs Ralph Regenvanu and Abel David. The conference featured a moving reconciliation ceremony, as chiefs from Vanuatu revealed the hidden history of past atrocities and sought to rebuild links across Oceania. 2012 celebrates the 1992 inquiry by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission. The Wantok 2012 conference came on the twentieth anniversary of the inquiry's report, which recommended that South Sea Islanders be formally recognised as a distinct disadvantaged group and be given access to health and welfare schemes. Emelda Davis president, believes that it is important to build a national body to link ASSI communities across Australia. "As it is now, we're fragmented with individual voices and the governments aren't listening," she says. "We need a national body so governments will sit up and take notice because they're dealing with a nation. Queensland has been at the forefront but we'll still need a national voice that can give us action in all areas: in the national education curriculum, in health and well-being, in things that will give our youth opportunities." (full article South Sea Islanders Unite in Australia, Inside Story, August 2012. inside.org.au/s...
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[@MrAustropman]

Good to know there is such a revival of this heritage in Australia. I had a great grandmother that was apparently "south sea islander" but no one on my father's side of the family knows more than this. I would love to know about my Melanesian/Polynesian bloodline. Proud to have Pacific islander heritage!

[@australiansouthseaislander2812]

please email me [e-mail]

[@australiansouthseaislander2812]

The term “Australian South Sea Islander” refers to the Australian descendants of people from more than 80 islands in the Western Pacific including the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides) in Melanesia, and the Loyalty Islands, Samoa, Kiribati, Rotuma (Fiji), Tuvalu in Polynesia and Micronesia who were recruited to the indentured labour trade akin to slavery which started in NSW in 1847, with an influx to QLD between 1863-1908, to work and establish Australia’s economical base in sugar cane, maritime and pastoral industries

[@gryphus64]

The war began when the Confederates bombarded Union soldiers at Fort Sumter, South Carolina on April 12, 1861. The war ended in Spring, 1865. Robert E. Lee surrendered the last major Confederate army to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse on April 9, 1865.Slavery Abolition Act, (1833), in British history, act of Parliament that abolished slavery in most British colonies, freeing more than 800,000 enslaved Africans in the Caribbean and South Africa as well as a small number in Canada. It received Royal Assent on August 28, 1833, and took effect on August 1, 1834. Slavery was illegal in the British Realm since 1833. What do these dates mean in a legal sense? The South Sea Islanders of Queensland are the descendants of South Sea Islanders brought to here from 1863 to 1904 from 80 Melanesian islands to work the State’s cotton and sugar plantations. So the "Enslavement" of people occurred 30 years after it was declared illegal. The Sugar Refining Company won't save you! I support reparations to the descendants and to the Islands from whence the South Sea Islanders came.