Visitors to Uluru, formerly Ayers Rock, are to be banned from climbing on the 863m-tall sandstone monolith, a sacred site for local indigenous peoples.
The governing board of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park - made up of eight representatives of the land’s traditional aboriginal owners and three representatives from Australia’s National Parks - unanimously voted in favour of the ban.
Chairman of the board Sammy Wilson, who is also a senior traditional owner, said that Uluru is “not a theme park like Disneyland”.
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"Some people, in tourism and government for example, might have been saying we need to keep it open but it's not their law that lies in this land," he told Fairfax Media.
Uluru plays a central role in the lore and mythology of the local Anangu indigenous people, and is considered a sacred site. Tribal leaders have long raised concerns about disrespectful behaviour by tourists, not limited to climbing.
In 2010, there were calls for a French exotic dancer who stripped to a bikini on the summit to be deported from Australia, The Daily Telegraph reported at the time.
David Ross, the director of the Central Land Council, which represents the traditional owners, said that the board’s vote represented “righting a historic wrong”.
"This decision has been a very long time coming and our thoughts are with the elders who have longed for this day but are no longer with us to celebrate it," he said.
The ban will go into effect from 26 October 2019 - 34 years to the day since the sacred site was ceremonially “returned” to the Anangu people
For decades, tourists were encouraged to scale Uluru, one of Australia’s most recognisable landmarks, but in recent years more and more people have chosen respect the signs placed at the base by its indigenous owners urging visitors not to climb.
Ten years ago, around 38% of visitors climbed Uluru, Fairfax Media reports. That number is estimated to have dropped to between 16 and 20%.
Uluru “should be as special to white Australians as it is to its Indigenous owners,” Sydney Morning Herald columnist Julie Power wrote earlier this year. “To climb the rock takes a determination to be ignorant of those Australians who cared for this country for 65,000 years before white man arrived.”
At least 35 people are known to have died climbing Uluru, News.com.au reports, most of them from heart attacks or slipping on the rock face after rainfall.
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