The Australian Prime Minister’s principal
adviser on indigenous affairs has called on the Australian Football League to "get its act
together" and take a stronger stance against the campaign of racial
abuse being directed against Aboriginal footballer Adam Goodes, according to Chip Le Grand of THE AUSTRALIAN. Warren Mundine described as “bizarre’’ a split within the AFL
Commission over whether the abuse of Goodes was racially
motivated. Mundine said, "This had been happening for a while and all of us had been looking, watching, thinking what is going on here? It was like watching a train running off its tracks. I thought the AFL should have come out a lot quicker. ... The AFL really has to start getting its act together on this. This
is something that has divided the nation. I have never seen anything
like it and it has raised some really ugly stuff." The AFL
Commission "is divided over the crowd treatment of Goodes, who will
return to football this week after withdrawing from Sydney’s team." While some members of the
nine-person commission accept the abuse of Goodes is racist and lament
the AFL’s "failure to lead the public response," a minority of
commissioners "hold the view that Goodes is to blame for his own abuse" (THE AUSTRALIAN, 8/4).
