What it means to be Aboriginal in Australia as the nation prepares to vote on an Indigenous ‘Voice’ can be viewed through the complex personal history of a senior Labor politician.
Kyam Maher, who says he is Aboriginal by birth and ‘initiation’, has ignored repeated requests to comment on research purported to show he has no Indigenous ancestry.
Mr Maher, who is Attorney-General and Minister for Aboriginal Affairs in South Australia‘s Labor government, has for at least the past seven years boasted of having Indigenous forebears.
Genealogical researchers for the Dark Emu Exposed website have recently completed a family tree for Mr Maher going back up to six generations and found no Aboriginal ancestors.
Each line of Mr Maher’s family has been traced to European immigrant men and women who were born in Ireland, England or Germany and came to Australia in the 19th century.
Roger Karge, the scientist behind Dark Emu Exposed, says he was commissioned to conduct research into Mr Maher’s genealogy by ‘interested Aboriginal people and associated organisations’.
Kyam Maher, South Australia’s Attorney-General and Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, has ignored repeated requests to answer questions about his Indigenous ancestry. Mr Maher, pictured wearing face paint, says he underwent initiation as an Anangu man
Genealogical researchers for the Dark Emu Exposed website have recently completed a family tree for Mr Maher going back six generations and found no Aboriginal ancestors. Mr Maher is pictured with Aboriginal elders while wearing the traditional red headband of an Anangu ‘wati’
Daily Mail Australia, which has obtained a copy of Mr Maher’s family tree, is not suggesting he has no Aboriginal ancestry, only that research has not identified any.
Mr Maher has not responded to questions about his heritage from Daily Mail Australia or genealogical findings – backed by hundreds of pages of material – put to him by Mr Karge.
Anyone seeking Indigenous-specific grants, Centrelink assistance, employment or access to school scholarships and university courses can be asked to prove their Aboriginal heritage.
The first of three criteria for a person to be considered Indigenous in Australia is that they actually be of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent.
They also need to self-identify as an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander person and be accepted as such by the community in which they live or formerly lived.
Mr Maher is South Australia’s top lawmaker but has so far not responded to questions about his Indigenous ancestry to meet that three-part test.
He has also not responded to calls from Indigenous elders in the state’s north-west to discuss his claims he is an initiated Anangu ‘wati’, or senior man.
Earlier this month Mr Maher introduced a First Nations Voice Bill which he said would provide ‘a body that is chosen from Aboriginal people, by Aboriginal people’ to advise South Australia’s parliament.
Those who seek to vote in the Voice or stand for election must be a ‘First Nations person’, according to the Bill.
The legislation uses the standard three-part criteria to define a First Nations person but also provides a definition for someone being ‘of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent’.
‘A person will be taken to be of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent if the person is biologically descended from the persons who inhabited Australia or the Torres Strait Islands… before European settlement,’ it states.
Two of the South Australian APY Lands’ most senior elders have now come forward to say Anangu initiation would normally only take place after years of cultural education. One of them is Trevor Adamson (pictured)
Research conducted by the Dark Emu Exposed website traced Kyam Maher’s ancestors back to England, Ireland and Germany. One of his mother’s grandfathers was William Pratt (left) and one her great-grandfathers was William Kellam (right)
Australians will this year face a referendum to change the Constitution and introduce a similar Indigenous Voice to advise federal parliament.
Mr Maher, who claims Tasmanian Indigenous ancestry, says he is the first ‘initiated’ Aboriginal man in the nation’s history to be appointed an attorney-general.
Daily Mail Australia understands he underwent some sort of initiation ceremony in the remote Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara region, known as APY Lands.
The precise location cannot be disclosed for cultural reasons but Mr Maher appears to have posted pictures of himself camping in the desert about the time of the ceremony.
Two of the APY Lands’ most senior elders have now come forward to say such an initiation would normally only be performed after years of cultural education.
Mr Maher was born in Papua New Guinea and grew up in Mount Gambier in South Australia’s south-east, about 1,500km from the APY Lands.
Donald Fraser, a respected Pitjantjatjara elder who has been a leading figure on APY Lands for decades, wrote to Mr Maher last year asking for further details of his initiation.
Mr Fraser, who was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia in 1994 ‘in recognition of service to the Aboriginal community’, is still waiting for a response to his letter.
‘Tjilpis (local elders) are concerned by public statements made by you and repeated by the SA Premier Peter Malinauskas that you are an initiated Anangu wati,’ Mr Fraser wrote.
Mr Maher, who claims Tasmanian Aboriginal ancestry, was born in Papua New Guinea and grew up in Mount Gambier in South Australia’s south-east, about 1,500km from where he underwent his initiation
Mr Fraser, a former chair of the APY executive board, then cited media reports which referenced the initiation.
In June 2021, Mr Maher, a 50-year-old father-of-three, was quoted telling CityMag he was ‘initiated on Yungkunjara [Yankunytjatjara] country in regional South Australia’.
In March last year when Mr Maher was sworn in as Attorney-General a Nine News report described him as ‘the first initiated Aboriginal man in that position in Australia’s history’.
Donald Fraser (above) has asked Mr Maher to explain his ‘initiation’ as an Anangu wati
Mr Malinauskas was quoted saying: ‘That is a big deal.’
At least two other reports described Mr Maher as the first initiated man to become Minister for Aboriginal Affairs.
Mr Fraser had hoped Mr Maher would provide further details about this initiation, which apparently took place about July 2020 on APY Lands.
He referred to Mr Maher being regularly photographed wearing a traditional red headband, which Daily Mail Australia has been told Mr Maher donned when visiting remote communities.
Wearing such a headband on APY Lands signifies a man is recognised as a wati.
‘Tjilpis wish to meet with you urgently on-Lands to discuss this situation, ascertain the state of your cultural knowledge, and if appropriate set out a program of training and cultural induction should it be the case you genuinely wish to become a wati in our culture,’ Mr Fraser wrote.
Rex Tjami, another prominent APY player and one of the men involved in Mr Maher’s initiation, told Daily Mail Australia he could not discuss the ceremony for cultural reasons but it was done properly.
Mr Fraser’s correspondence was accompanied by a cover letter from Trevor Adamson, an APY executive board member and former chair from the Pukatja community.
Mr Maher has repeatedly been photographed wearing a traditional red headband while visiting remote communities since his initiation. He is pictured on APY Lands with senior Anangu lawman Murray George and South Australian premier Peter Malinauskas
‘I understand… Kyam is being called to account under Anangu Lore,’ Mr Adamson wrote of the initiation ritual.
Mr Adamson said Murray George, the senior APY lawman, had tried to call Mr Maher to ‘underscore the gravity’ of the situation.
‘Kyam is to telephone Mr Fraser to arrange to attend the Lands to sit with a select select group of tjilpi senior watis,’ Mr Adamson wrote.
Mr Adamson told Daily Mail Australia he was ‘really frustrated’ with Mr Maher’s lack of communication with senior Aboriginal men on APY Lands.
If Mr Maher considered himself a wati, he should regularly be attending APY Lands to address Aboriginal ‘business’, Mr Adamson said.
Mr Fraser told Daily Mail Australia he too was frustrated Mr Maher had not responded to his concerns about the initiation ceremony.
‘It’s not a fight, it’s just sorting it out and helping him to understand,’ he said. ‘He needs to listen and understand – that’s all we want.’
Genealogical research conducted by the Dark Emu Exposed website found no Aboriginal ancestors in Mr Maher’s family tree. Mr Maher is pictured with his parents Viv and James
Mr Maher appears to have first publicly spoken of having Aboriginal bloodlines about 2015 when he revealed his mother Viv had recently discovered she had Indigenous ancestors from western Victoria.
‘Our family includes Indigenous heritage but for two generations it’s not something families discussed a lot,’ he told NITV.
‘It’s only later in life my mum became acquainted with her heritage. It’s not something that played an active role in my growing up… but it’s something that I’m very proud of.’
Aboriginal flags in Mount Gambier flew at half-mast when a memorial service was held for the upper house MP’s mother, social worker and advocate ‘Aunty’ Viv Maher in 2017.
One obituary stated: ‘Later in her career, Viv found and acknowledged her Aboriginal heritage through a male forebear of hers married to an Aboriginal Tasmanian woman.’
‘The name of that “wonderful woman” was unrecorded, Viv said.’
Last year Mr Maher repeated he had Tasmanian Aboriginal ancestry and ‘it’s always been known in my family that we have Aboriginal heritage.’
Mr Maher has not responded to requests to clarify his claims of Aboriginal ancestry.
Mr Karge, the editor of Dark Emu Exposed, wrote to Mr Maher in late January to report the findings of research into his parents’ ancestry.
‘We are genealogical and historical researchers and we have been commissioned by a number of third parties to provide the family trees and genealogy of Mr James Maher and his late wife Viv Maher,’ Mr Karge wrote.
‘Specifically, we were commissioned by interested Aboriginal people and associated organisations to determine if James and Viv Maher were of Aboriginal descent…
‘Our research appears to show that, based on the publicly available records, that neither Mr James Maher, nor his late wife Viv Maher, appear to be of Aboriginal descent.
‘We could identify no ancestors, in either of their family trees, who were of Aboriginal descent.’
Mr Karge then asked Mr Maher if he wished to make any comment on his findings or suggest any corrections to more than 200 pages of supporting documents.
The amateur historian said the private or unrecorded adoption of an Aboriginal child into Mr Maher’s family line could still mean he had Indigenous ancestry.
A relationship out of wedlock between one of Mr Maher’s ancestors and an Aboriginal person could also have produced a child who was incorporated into the family.
‘You’ve always got to allow for that,’ Mr Karge said.
Sky News commentator Andrew Bolt used Mr Karge’s research when he raised Mr Maher’s heritage on his television program and in a newspaper column earlier this month.
‘Now, I’m not claiming anyone here was dishonest – maybe Mrs Maher got confused or made assumptions that turned out to be wrong or relied on what turned out to be false information and passed it on to her son,’ Bolt said.
