Protesters will again rally in Bendigo against Adani’s proposed mine in Queensland, this time calling on locals to participate in a human sign on a Spring Gully soccer pitch.
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Bendigo Sustainability Group secretary Michelle Pollard said people would be gathering on Saturday and wearing bright colours.
“Colours like red, yellow, pink, orange, and purple. We are going to get them to spell out the words ‘stop Adani’,” Ms Pollard said.
The gathering would be photographed from the air.
The BSG invited people to come down to the soccer pitch at 89 Spring Gully Rd at 3pm.
“Saturday is a nation-wide day that’s happening in Melbourne and Sydney. It’s an action to send a message to our leaders in state and federal governments that we don’t support the proposed mine and we don’t support the government putting money towards the mine,” Ms Pollard said.
Central Victoria Climate Action would be in attendance and the group’s Bernard Tonkin said BSG’s gathering was not the first to take place locally.
His group helped organise previous gatherings outside Commonwealth and Westpac bank branches in Bendigo and Castlemaine.
In May the group spearheaded action as activists dressed as dead pieces of coral reef “floated” along Hargreaves Mall for a protest at Bridget McKenzie’s office. In September, Macedon Ranges Stop Adani rallied regional groups to march on Labor MP Lisa Chesters office.
Mr Tonkin said Macedon Ranges Stop Adani and the BSG’s events showed opposition to Adani was mushrooming.
Groups were galvinised against new bids to open coal-rich deposits in the country’s north-east as well as by opposition to the $1 billion of tax payer money for the Carmichael mine’s infrastructure, he said.
“Not only that, but it’s the encouragement of a massive new coal development by the Coalition and Labor just when the Great Barrier Reef is 50 per cent dead from carbon emissions,” Mr Tonkin said.
“It’s such an affront to all the efforts, like those by sustainability groups, to put solar panels on roofs, to expand. It’s an affront to values of protecting the environment, of honouring future generations, of thinking about people in poor countries who can least respond (to climate change),” he said.
The federal Labor party supported the Carmichael mine, while the Coalition supported the $1 billion investment.