Australia's first Aboriginal MP brushes off racist taunts
05:55 AM Aug 31, 2010SYDNEY - The first Aborigine to be elected to the Australian parliament yesterday said he was not worried by racist taunts that followed his win, saying they were outweighed by messages of support.
Mr Ken Wyatt (picture) rose above childhood poverty to become the first indigenous person ever elected to the powerful lower House of Representatives.
Since then, he has received at least 50 racist emails and phone calls from angry voters, with some saying they would not have voted for him had they known he was indigenous.
"They don't perturb me," said Mr Wyatt, 58, of the jibes. "Throughout my life I have experienced the sharp edge of some of the racist taunts that have come my way, but when I outweigh these by the hundreds and hundreds of emails and calls I've had, they are only minuscule in the bigger picture."
Meanwhile, an Australian "kingmaker" MP has complained about a series of harassing phone calls which he warned could destabilise negotiations.
Mr Rob Oakeshott said one caller to his home claimed to be "the devil". Mr Oakeshott, together with three other independents and a Greens MP hold the balance of power in parliament.
They are in meetings with Labour Prime Minister Julia Gillard and her conservative Liberal challenger, Mr Tony Abbott, to decide who can form government.
Mr Oakeshott has called for an explanation. "If these are Rambo-style phone calls that I'm receiving from loose cannons, that's fine, but that is an issue that needs to be responded to by leadership," he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "What is of deeper concern is that is this a strategic move to try and destabilise this whole process and destabilise the government." AFP
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