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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-11-15 Daily Xml
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Afghanistan

The Hon. A. MICHAELS (Enfield—Minister for Small and Family Business, Minister for Consumer and Business Affairs, Minister for Arts) (15:42): I rise today to draw the house's attention to an ongoing issue affecting many in my community of Enfield, and that is the ongoing situation in Afghanistan. With the fall of Kabul and the Taliban taking over, not only does it affect the people over there but it does have a deep impact on our local refugee community, particularly those living and working in Enfield.

What brought this to light for me was actually at a premiere of a fantastic documentary at the Adelaide Film Festival called Watandar: My Countryman. I met the filmmaker and director, Jolyon Hoff, and the subject of the documentary, Muzafar Ali, at the Hawke Centre. On the Hawke Centre emailing list, I received an email about a Afghan refugee who was having a photographic exhibition at the Hawke Centre earlier this year, so I thought, 'I wonder if the Afghans in my electorate know that this is happening.' I am always trying to bring my portfolio into my electorate and make sure we have that crossover, so I invited a group of people from my electorate to see this photographic exhibition at the Hawke Centre.

I had a really good conversation with Jolyon Hoff and Muzafar Ali, who talked us through not only the photographic exhibition but the production of the documentary, Watandar. It was premiered at the Adelaide Film Festival. I had tears in my eyes from probably the first 30 seconds, when Muzafar walked through the Adelaide Airport with his very young children and his wife, coming here via Indonesia as refugees.

It prompted me to think about the fact we are probably not hearing terribly much about what is going on in Kabul at the moment. It is not really on our TV screens and I think this is a good opportunity for me to raise that issue, as the atrocities are continuing and they are having a significant impact here.

If you get the opportunity to have a look at the documentary, Mr Speaker, it is a fantastic documentary that actually is about Muzafar going through to Marree and the areas where the Afghan cameleers in the 1880s—in particular the 1860s to the 1880s—were brought over to help transport routes essentially, to help get goods through the north and west of South Australia. They did an incredibly difficult job. He has gone back through the history and the importance of identity for Afghans in Australia. It is not just the new refugees we are more aware of; it is the history of the Afghans who came here in the 1800s. We had the first mosque at Marree, and it was finished in 1882. There is not much of it left, but it is shown in the documentary.

The other interesting take on the documentary was the interaction between the Afghans and our First Nations people. One of the photographs and one of the stories is of Nici Cumpston, who you, Mr Speaker, might be aware is a fantastic First Nations curator who works at the Art Gallery of South Australia. I saw the photo of Nici when I was at the Hawke Centre. I always saw Nici as a First Nations curator and did not realise she had an Afghan background.

There are so many of our wonderful First Nations people from that area who have Afghan blood and First Nations blood. To have those stories interact and to have that identity being explored through this documentary, particularly for the new Afghans who are looking for their identity in Australia, I think is a really important story to tell.

The documentary touched me, and I would love as many people as possible to see the work of Jolyon Hoff and Muzafar Ali in telling that story. Muzafar is the most grateful, positive person I have ever met, with a very tragic history in his story of coming to Australia. Part of the documentary is him talking to friends still over in Kabul. As the documentary progressed, the desperation in those voices came through—of being worried about being killed by the Taliban and having their children taken away. Kids, particularly boys from 14 onwards, are being taken by the Taliban and forced to join the Taliban.

On a day-to-day basis people are trying to make sure their children are alive and trying to get them out, when they cannot. Those stories are important for us to know, important for our local community, and it is something I encourage the house to pay attention to.

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