If Australia is serious about healing, we must start with truth

"Although we come from different languages, different ways of living, different tribal dances, different dreamtimes, we may all know that if we need help, truly, all people are going to help. The voice from the people - us people - like a thunder when she roar.'

- Paddy Morlunbun, July 1978.

January is wet season in the Kimberley. Before a storm breaks, the air hangs thick with tension. The same unease settles over the nation as 26 January approaches.

This date marks the beginning of invasion and colonisation. Aboriginal people were dispossessed, massacred, imprisoned, enslaved and forced from Country. The trauma of those events is not historical, but lived, inherited and ongoing. Aboriginal people have protested the use of this day as a national celebration since 1938.

Nearly a century on, the discomfort remains, and not because the truth has changed, but because it still has not been reckoned with. Generations after invasion, the challenges continue: Closing the Gap outcomes are worsening, incarceration and suicide rates among our people continue to rise, life expectancy remains a decade lower than that of non-Indigenous Australians, our Country and cultural heritage are under threat and persistent systemic racism is destroying lives.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have resisted, organised and fought for justice every day since invasion. In the Kimberley, our Old People came together fearlessly, refusing assimilation and demanding recognition of truth, law, culture and connection to Country. That struggle built the Kimberley Land Council nearly 50 years ago, and it continues today.

Our Old People taught us that when people need help, they help one another. That even across different languages, dreamtimes and dancing - when voices come together, they can sound like thunder. It is a truth Australia knows in moments, but has yet to fully live by.

When storms break, they bring rain and renewal and wash away the bad spirits from Country - just as old systems can be disrupted to make way for change.

The leaders of the Kimberley have shown that walking together produces incredible outcomes: securing native title recognition, leading innovative clean energy projects, to recognising traditional land management practices and developing Indigenous ranger programs. They have helped revive our languages in schools and secured support for our leaders to walk the halls of Parliament. Our people's resilience has built this progress, yet resilience should never be mistaken for acceptance.

Truth-telling is a central demand of the Uluru Statement from the Heart because a shared future is impossible without a shared understanding of our history. A healthy democracy does not require everyone to agree. But it does require a shared reality.

If Australia is serious about healing, justice and a shared future, it must start with truth. New data shows that most Australians want to change the date. People are listening. They are hearing our stories and beginning to confront the truth. The question now is whether our leaders will do the same.

This moment calls for courage, not delay. Let us use today, and every day, to make space for truth-telling instead of division and to carry forward the stories of what Kimberley Old People courageously fought to protect. Truth works like lightning. It cuts through the dark to expose what we have tried to ignore. And when truth strikes, the voices of the people follow — like a thunder when she roar.