Charged for protesting for refugee rights
Standing in the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court yesterday, I felt a mixture of relief and indignation. My crime? Demanding justice for refugees left behind by the Labor government. My punishment? Eight months of good behaviour and a $200 fine. No conviction, but this was not justice.
It began with a protest on 4 May last year. Fifty people, united in our demand for permanent visas for 10,000 refugees abandoned by the Labor government, occupied Immigration Minister Andrew Giles’ office in Thomastown. Our message was clear: these people deserve better.
But instead of addressing our concerns—that thousands of people have been left in limbo and at risk of deportation under federal Labor’s refugee policies—the police were sent in to clear us out. I was hit with eight charges, including an outrageous accusation that I assaulted a police officer (an emergency worker). It was an attempt to silence and intimidate those who refuse to be quiet about these refugees’ plight.
The charge of assaulting an emergency worker carries a mandatory six-month jail sentence. Enacted during the pandemic to protect paramedics, it’s now being weaponised against political activists. The authorities were sending a message: protest at your own peril.
In the end, after negotiations with the public prosecutor, I was advised to plead guilty to assaulting police and resisting arrest in exchange for police dropping six other charges. It was a bitter pill to swallow, but I had little choice.
What is perhaps most outrageous is the hypocrisy of it all. I was paraded through the justice system for daring to protest the minister’s inaction. But the minister faces no consequences for the government’s appalling treatment of refugees and asylum seekers. People overseeing injustice live in relative luxury. Those opposing injustice get police charges. Where is the “justice” in that?
This is not just about my experience; it’s about the broader failings of our political system when it comes to refugees. The Labor Party has repeatedly failed to show a shred of humanity. It is the party that introduced mandatory detention. It is the party that chose to be complicit with Liberal Prime Minister John Howard’s all-out war on refugees in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
It is also the party that introduced enhanced screening processes which led to the forcible deportation of more than 1,000 refugees to Sri Lanka and reopened offshore detention.
After nine years in the wilderness, this party returned to power with a promise to be more compassionate. Yet, while I was fighting these charges, the ALP has announced new barbaric measures: deportation laws that could destroy the lives of thousands of refugees. Instead of offering hope to those in need, they have perpetuated a system of cruelty and indifference.
For years, the Labor Party has pandered to the politics of fear—demonising refugees for political gain. It has turned its back on those who need help the most, all in the name of electoral expediency. It is a shameful legacy.
It’s the ALP that should be put on trial, not refugee activists.
Aran Mylvaganam is a founder of the Tamil Refugee Council.
