When Lee Rhiannon was a young activist, she remembers seeing the anti-Vietnam War movement grow from a handful of people gathered in Sydney’s Martin Place to a mass movement of hundreds of thousands of people. This was Lee’s first experience of the power of global solidarity.
As the Secretary of the Australian Western Sahara Association, Lesley Osborn has been calling on the Australian people to put their solidarity into action for the past fifteen years. Asked what drives her activism, Lesley told us: “Solidarity is unity and joining with others to make change.”
At the peak conference of Australian civil society organisations, Union Aid Abroad – APHEDA called on its friends and allies to stand in solidarity with the Saharawi people in their long struggle for self-determination and independence.
Tecber Ahmed Saleh’s call for solidarity between the Saharawi and Australian people attracted unionists, internationalists, and activists from around Australia.
On 27 February the people of Western Sahara celebrated Western Sahara National Day marking the 43rd anniversary of the declaration of their state, the Saharawi Republic.