Any comments on this ongoing story from Australia, I don't know how many of
the people on this list have been following it?

Bill Bartlett
Bracknell Tasmania

============================================================

     Sydney Morning Herald
     Tuesday, July 8, 1997

Visa review for visiting black activist

     By JODIE BROUGH in Canberra

     Immigration officials are urgently investigating the entry into
     Australia of a former member of the Black Panthers - a United
     States black militant organisation - who was once jailed for
     hijacking a plane to Cuba.

     The Prime Minister, Mr Howard, said yesterday he had taken steps to
     have Mr Lorenzo Kom'Boa Ervin's visa investigated on the grounds
     that he had "misrepresented his past" when he applied for it and
     had used a different surname.

     Mr Ervin, jailed in the US for the 1969 hijacking and paroled in
     1983, was due to give a speech in Brisbane last night as part of a
     four-week lecture tour organised by a local anarchist group, Angry
     People.

     But the tour appeared to be in doubt last night, with the Brisbane
     venue, the West End Migrant Resource Centre, saying the speech was
     unlikely to be given.

     Mr Howard's intervention came as Ms Pauline Hanson's One Nation
     party complained Mr Ervin was "a known terrorist and gun runner"
     and demanded he be thrown out of the country.

     Mr Howard said it was "quite wrong that somebody like that should
     have got into the country in the first place and it's a result of
     the misrepresentation and the matter is being urgently investigated
     by the Immigration Department".

     "I think somebody with that sort of background oughtn't remain in
     Australia and I hope he doesn't," he told Radio 2GB. "I can't
     really say any more for legal reasons."

     Mr Ervin accused the media of reacting to his visit with hysteria
     and sensationalism.

     "I am certainly in favour of radical social change - I don't shrink
     from saying that, but of course I haven't come to Australia to blow
     up the downtown buildings or incite the Aborigines to revolution or
     race riots," he told ABC Radio.

     Mr Ervin said he had lectured in 20 countries without incident,
     suggesting he may pursue libel writs against some "conservative"
     media organisations.

     He was quoted by the Brisbane Courier-Mail as saying there were
     frightening similarities between Afro-Americans and Australian
     Aborigines, with both groups suffering from poverty and a high rate
     of incarceration.

     He was quoted as saying he wanted to talk about "how we aid our
     brothers and sisters here in Australia to deal with the abysmal
     condition that they are suffering from", describing his political
     objectives as "freedom for black people and the overthrow of the
     capitalist system".

     The national director of One Nation, Mr David Ettridge, said Mr
     Ervin should be deported immediately.

     "Sure we want freedom of speech and equality but we have to look at
     the purpose of his visit," Mr Ettridge said.

     He said he assumed that if Mr Ervin was talking to Aborigines
     "along the lines of white supremacists" that he "might be inciting
     them into some form of civil disobedience".

============================================================

Australian Government Backs Down on Deportation

Date: Sat, 12 Jul 1997 10:35:36 +1000 (EST)
From: donna <[log in to unmask]>

The Australian Government has been forced to withdraw the decision by
Acting Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, to cancel the visa of
Lorenzo Kom'boa Ervin, and has been ordered to pay Lorenzo's legal costs.
It now seems the government is considering its next move to try and save
face in what has become for them a very embarrassing situation.  The
Immigration Department has indicated that Lorenzo may be required to
answer further questions, however solicitors for Lorenzo have not been
contacted by the department, or given any indication as to when any such
interview would take place.

It is usual process for travellers entering Australia, to be questioned by
immigration officers at the airport, should they not fully complete their
passenger cards or indicate that they have a criminal conviction.  If this
is Lorenzo's case, as the government have claimed, why is it that Lorenzo
was not questioned, but simply arrested and thrown into a maximum security
prison to await deportation?

Opposition Immigration spokesman Duncan Kerr has described the incident as
a farce and has accused the Government of gross incompetence, while
Queensland Premier Rob Borbidge has urged  the Federal Government
to ensure Lorenzo is deported.

Yesterday, after his release, Lorenzo attended NAIDOC celebrations in
Musgrave Park, West End, as a guest of the Murri people, and gave a brief
speech.  Today he is doing a spot of sightseeing and will be attending a
Murri youth festival in West End.  Lorenzo will then resume his tour, in
Lismore (Nthrn New South Wales) on Monday, then onto Sydney,
Canberra, and Melbourne.  For all intents and purposes, Lorenzo is a free
man, with a new 90 day visa (his previous visa was only for 30 days).
While the Australian Government licks its wounds, both Lorenzo and Angry
People have called for an apology from Canberra, but we're not
holding our breath.

============================================================