Australians resent a ban on climbing their country’s most famous rock
Oct 24th 2019SYDNEYIT VIES WITH Sydney Opera House as the most famous symbol of Australia. Yet to the original inhabitants of the surrounding area it is not just beautiful, but sacred, the scene of holy rituals. Signs erected by the Anangu people at the base of Uluru declare, “Under our traditional law, climbing is not permitted.” Yet climbing Ayers Rock, as most other Australians knew the vast red monolith until recently, has long been a favoured pastime of tourists. Some litter, defecate or strip while they scramble up. Fully 37 people have died trying to reach the summit in sweltering heat. The Anangu have had enough: they own the site and from October 26th will ban visitors from ascending. It is “not a theme park like Disneyland”, reasoned Sammy Wilson, one of its traditional owners, when the change was announced.Some Australians complain they are being robbed of a birthright. Pauline Hanson, leader of the populist One Nation party, has likened the ban to a shutdown of Bondi, Sydney’s most famous beach. She recently made a pilgrimage to climb the rock, but quickly became stuck and was forced to slide back down on her backside. She later admitted she could “see the sense in banning” the climb “due to safety reasons”. Those who view Uluru as a spiritual place smiled. “You’ve got to ask why it was that she couldn’t get up there,” says Tom Calma, the co-chair of Reconciliation Australia, a charity.Choose us for news analysis that respects your time and intelligenceSubscribe to The EconomistWe filter out the noise of the daily news cycle and analyse the trends that matterWe give you rigorous, deeply researched and fact-checked journalism. That’s why Americans named us their most trusted news source in 2017Available wherever you are—in print, digital and, uniquely, in audio, fully narrated by professional broadcastersThis website adheres to all nine of NewsGuard‘s standards of credibility and transparency.ORContinue reading this articleRegister with an email address