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Montevideo, March 29th 2024 - 06:48 UTC

 

 

Republicanism: Australia will honor indigenous cultures in its A$ 5 bill instead of Charles III

Thursday, February 2nd 2023 - 11:03 UTC
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Australia central bank had already said that retaining Elizabeth on the $5 dollar bill had had as much to do with her personal stature as with her position. Australia central bank had already said that retaining Elizabeth on the $5 dollar bill had had as much to do with her personal stature as with her position.

Australia's new Five Dollar bill will replace an image of British monarch Charles III with one honoring Australian Indigenous cultures. It is the last banknote in Australia that still bears the head of recently deceased Queen Elizabeth II.

Australia central bank had already said that retaining Elizabeth on the $5 dollar bill had had as much to do with her personal stature as with her position.

The Reserve Bank of Australia said that the decision had been taken in consultation with the government, which supports the change, and that a new design would be chosen that “honors the culture and history of the First Australians.”

The design will take several years to be printed and finalized and the old note will remain legal tender for some time after the new one goes into circulation, the bank said.

The British monarch's head will also remain on all of Australia's coins, with the first ones featuring Charles' likeness to be minted this year.

Australians voted fairly narrowly, roughly 55%-45%, not to become a republic in a 1999 referendum, but observers expected the discussion might resurface when Elizabeth II's long reign ended.

Although the role is largely ceremonial, King Charles remains Australia's head of state, as he does in several other members of the Commonwealth including New Zealand.

Prime Minister Antony Albanese, of the center-left Labor Party, has been an advocate for a republic in the past, though he said soon after Elizabeth's death that it was too soon to revisit the issue.

Opposition leader Peter Dutton said in a radio interview on Thursday that he believed Albanese's government was the driving force behind the announcement hailing from the central bank.

“There's no question about this, that it's directed by the government and I think the Prime Minister should own up to it,” Dutton said on local radio station 2GB.

Greens Senator Lidia Thorpe, an opposition lawmaker of Indigenous descent, wrote on Twitter: “This is a massive win for the grassroots, First Nations people who have been fighting to decolonize this country. First Nations people never ceded our Sovereignty to any King or Queen, ever. Time for a Treaty Republic!”

Categories: Politics, International.

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  • Brasileiro

    Ótimo! Valuing original peoples and cultures is not republicanism. It's Humanism!

    Feb 03rd, 2023 - 12:41 pm 0
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