Bakrie warns, settle Australian land titles

Bakrie warns, settle Australian land titles

SYDNEY (AFP): Indonesian businessman Aburizal Bakrie warned
here yesterday that investors could be frightened off if
uncertainty over land rights for Aboriginals persisted.

"If that continues to be an issue, a big issue, everybody will
be afraid to own land on Australia or invest, even in
manufacturing industries or property or agriculture," he told The
Sydney Morning Herald.

"If foreign investors are not sure if they hold the land or
not it will be very difficult," Bakrie was quoted as saying.
His family owns about 2.5 million hectares (6.2 million acres) in
the Northern Territory, mostly made up of the vast Tipperary
station.

The Bakrie Group, which is one of the biggest foreign
landowners in Australia and owns Indonesia's largest feedlot,
would this year import 65,000 head of cattle from Australia, the
newspaper said.

In a list of foreign-controlled pastoral companies published
in same newspaper last week, the group was listed second behind
the U.S. concern, Qld and NT Pastoral Co, and ahead of Desa
Cattle Company of Malaysia and National Mutual of France.

Among individual landowners, the Sultan of Brunei owned a
total of 6.1 million hectares (15 million acres) of pastoral
land, the newspaper reported.

Aboriginals prepared yesterday for a political fight over land
rights.

The fight will focus on a 10-point plan drafted by Prime
Minister John Howard in response to a court ruling that native
title can coexist in some cases with the pastoral leases which
cover more than 40 percent of the continent.

At Timber Creek, 600 kilometers (370 miles) southwest of
Darwin, Aboriginal leaders representing about 65,000 people,
rejected Howard's plan and burned a copy of it.

They said it threatened their fundamental rights and
reconciliation with non-indigenous Australians for the benefit of
a handful of rich landowners.

Howard's plan would effectively, but not entirely extinguish
native title on pastoral leases, impose a sunset clause on native
claims and rule out claims on waterways, ocean resources and land
required for infrastructure.

It would significantly upgrade pastoral rights and allow state
governments to offer exclusive land tenure.

The government would fund the potentially huge compensation
payable to Aborigines who lose their native title rights.

"I think it is a declaration of war. That means there is going
to be a political war between the government and Aboriginal
people," said Galarrwuy Yunupingu, chairman of the Northern Land
Council.

Howard has "made an enemy of the Aboriginal people of this
nation", he said.