The following transcript records part of a walk along Bennett Brook with Robert Bropho, a Nyungar Elder, in 1986. The walk began from the Benara Road on the East side of the brook.

"Those big spikes coming in there (metal spikes - 2 feet long - in the ground, connected to pipes and a water pump put there by the SEC) - it's like spikes in my mother's body. This isn't water, this is blood. That root is some part of her leg. That tree isn't dead tree, it's blackfellas. That hole looks awful. I got a funny feeling when I saw them drawing out those things there. (spears) I got cold shivers in my spine.

Why they (SEC, Kimber, Holding) saying it's only the water (the visible, running water) is because White man's law says no man can deny the next property owner water. Water has freedom of movement. You can't stop it. You get back to property owners - in other words because they can't control the water they say that it is the blackfellas' spiritual side. They're not looking at it from our point of view. They're only looking at it their way. No white man can deny another water.

Sand being put in the motor of the water pump by the boys when we drove the SEC contractors off the sacred ground when they were continuing the working in contempt of Court, laying pipes, digging the big hole for the pipes, filling it in, breaking their own law in contempt of court. Treating us, the blackfellas, like shit, our belief as if it were nothing. And no one would do nothing to stop them, even though we had a court injunction, when we were going about it the proper way, the lawful way. Well the boys did what they had to do to protect their belief, the belief of their grandmothers and grandfathers, their way. Sand - that can be cleaned out. They've got plenty of money.

That hurt there can't be taken away - the water pump, pipes, spears in the ground scraping the creek bed, like scraping the skin/hair of our mother. That hurt there no White man will ever know, not even Jesus Christ. How do you think we felt of them doing the dirty on us, digging this all up while we was in Court?

NEXT: PRISON Vs SACRED SITE

Contacts
Swan Valley Nyungah Community (08) 9377 3550
Pyrton Action Group (08) 9279 6781