MEDIA ALERT
‘SAVE THE HEART OF ADELAIDE’ RALLY - SUNDAY 6 JULY
DEFENDING ADELAIDE’S PARK LANDS, HERITAGE & DEMOCRACY
Community members, civic leaders, and advocacy groups will gather next Sunday 6 July on the steps of South Australia’s Parliament House to protest against the Malinauskas Government’s serious incursions into the Adelaide Park Lands and public land, which they say go to the ‘Heart of Adelaide’.
Rally organizers say Adelaide has two globally significant and iconic attributes. They are the Adelaide Park Lands, unique in encircling our city in a park, and our South Australian State Parliament, home of world-first achievements in democracy, being the first to legislate to grant women their full political rights, to achieve universal suffrage and to introduce secret-ballot voting and ‘one-vote one-value.’
“In an unprecedented move, Premier Malinauskas is now undermining both our globally significant attributes on behalf of commercial interests.”
The rally, designed to give the public ‘voice’ over these proposed big changes to Adelaide, is being jointly organized by the Save Festival Plaza Alliance and the Adelaide Park Lands Association.
It opposes:
* The Walker Tower 2, a 160-metre high, speculative commercial skyscraper by Sydney-based Walker Corporation being constructed on Festival Plaza, key public land behind our State Parliament, seriously diminishing and overshadowing the site of our world democratic firsts;
* The seizure of Adelaide Park Land and the stripping of its ‘open, green and public’ protections in an unprecedented legislative swoop. In this case, the seizure of Possum Park and John Brown Park has been to facilitate LIV Golf, financed by the Saudi regime —raising serious questions about accountability, transparency, and ethical values. Longer term damage includes the chopping down of hundreds of mature and significant trees and the construction on Park Lands of commercial buildings.
Location: Steps of Parliament House, North Terrace
Time: 11.00AM Sunday 6 July
Speakers: Community leaders and activists including:
The Hon. Rev. Dr Lynn Arnold AO, former Premier of SA.
Elizabeth Vines OAM, Conservationist and Heritage architect
Robert Farnan, Convener, Save Festival Plaza Alliance
Sarah Russo, President, Adelaide Parklands Association (APA)
Phillip Martin, Deputy Lord Mayor
Ammeran Ali, Youth Environment Council, SA Youth Forum. She is a Reynella East high school student.
MC for the Rally: Loine Sweeney (APA Managing Committee, Save Festival Plaza Alliance committee, former EO, Women’s Suffrage Centenary).
Contact for Media Enquiries:
Chris Rann 0418 832 512
Loine Sweeney 0417 214 088