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Jasmine and Edith Coe come to Dover to commemorate dad Paul putting up Aboriginal flag in 1976

16:12, 17 June 2022

updated: 16:40, 17 June 2022

A commemoration will take place to recall the arrival of two Aboriginals on a beach to claim the land for their people.

Paul Coe and Cecil Patten arrived at Dover on November 2, 1976, and planted their flag.

Paul Coe and Cecil Patten hoisting the flag in Dover in 1976. Picture: Waterloo Redfern Community Archive
Paul Coe and Cecil Patten hoisting the flag in Dover in 1976. Picture: Waterloo Redfern Community Archive

Now Mr Coe's daughters Jasmine and Edith Coe are coming to that beach.to unveil a specially designed memorial for that act.

It will be a metal plaque fastened to the beach wall.

This will be for a festival celebrating Indigenous cultures called ORIGINS.

The two women will come to the beach at noon on Saturday, July 9, as part of a wider commemoration of Aboriginal activism in the UK.

Paul Coe is an Australian Aboriginal rights activist. He is particularly known for his role in protests against the Springboks tour of his country in 1971.

Jasmine is retracing her father's 1976 footsteps. Picture: Jasmine Coe
Jasmine is retracing her father's 1976 footsteps. Picture: Jasmine Coe

The South African rugby team had come over during an era when its country was under the apartheid racial segregation and oppression regime.

Mr Coe, now aged 73, is one of the Wiradjuri group of Aboriginals from New South Wales.

Miss Coe a Wiradjuri-British artist, travelled to Australia for the first time in 2016 to connect to her Aboriginal heritage.

ORIGINS is run by the inter-cultural arts company Border Crossings.

It is a year-long festival, which is held in collaboration with institutions across the UK including the British Museum.

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