Speeches
Thursday, 05 June 2025
Launch of ‘LOWITJA – A Life of Leadership and Legacy’ Exhibition
Rod and I are pleased to join you for the launch of the ‘LOWITJA – A Life of Leadership and Legacy’ Exhibition, against the backdrop of National Reconciliation Week, which concluded on Tuesday.
It’s my pleasure to be Patron in Chief of The Bob Hawke Ministerial Centre and to support its goals of strengthening democracy, valuing diversity and building our state’s and nation’s future.
Dr O’Donoghue was too a patron of The Hawke Centre, for several years, and it’s lovely to share this connection with her.
The only time I met Dr O’Donoghue was at the United Nations in New York in 1992.
I was a young diplomat and she was about to become the first Aboriginal person – and a woman at that - to address the United Nations General Assembly, during the launch of the United Nations International Year of Indigenous Peoples.
She left a strong impression on me – her quiet confidence, her commanding presence, her obvious determination.
I followed her advocacy work with interest and, as Governor, it’s been my pleasure to actively engage with the Lowitja Institute, to visit the site of the old Colebrook Home, where Dr O’Donoghue grew up; and to attend the Oration in her name, hosted by the Don Dunstan Foundation.
In 2023 Dr O’Donoghue’s image was projected on the front of Government House as part of an Illuminate Adelaide Festival piece on prominent South Australian women, which was viewed by 60,000 people.
Those of us here today are familiar with Dr O’Donoghue’s public image, shaped by her incredible life story and her myriad achievements.
I’m grateful this exhibition enables us to peer beyond the curtain, as it were, to gain a greater sense of her as an aboriginal woman and a distinguished Australian who was known on the world stage.
Next week marks one year since the death of my own mother, the late Jennifer Cashmore, who also accumulated a large collection of items during a life in public service.
Sorting through the items someone has collected and kept during their lifetime deepens my understanding of them – and reminds of the challenges they faced and opportunities they grasped, of the milestone events and minutia of everyday life, of what was truly important to them.
I thank Deb Edwards, Dr O’Donoghue’s niece, for having the idea to organise an exhibition after going through Dr O’Donoghue’s possessions and seeing the array of interesting items her aunt accumulated over the years.
I have read that Dr O’Donoghue – perhaps generously - referred to her vast collection as a ‘gallery’.
From my own recent experiences, I suspect that sorting her items involved many hours of dedicated labour and organisation!
Friends,
I thank The Hawke Centre, in partnership with the Lowitja O’Donoghue Foundation and the Lowitja Institute, for creating and hosting this exhibition.
Thank you for sharing Lowitja’s story – a story driven by integrity, intellect, and most importantly, heart.
It’s a worthy tribute to a woman whose extraordinary desire to surpass the limits placed upon her and her people remains unmatched in South Australian history.
It is my great pleasure to declare the exhibition open.