Ronnie Wavehill

Ronnie Wavehill also known as Ronnie Wavehill Wirrpngayarri Jangala (c. 1936 – 20 May 2020) was a Gurindji stockman who was born at Wave Hill Station, Northern Territory, Australia. He took part in the Wave Hill walk-off and he was a cultural storyteller, Indigenous cultural informant and singer.

Life in the Northern Territory Wavehill was the son of Cracker Jarluyarri Jampin and Mariah Yakngarri Nangari and was one of seven children. He many years of his early childhood travelling through Gurinji Country, and further afield, with his grandparents by foot. They would travel hundreds of kilometres to follow seasonal ceremonial gatherings and connect with Country and Countrymen. This time with them, who were elders among his people, gave him Gurindji language proficiency significantly higher than many of his peers.

In 1945, when Wavehill was 10 years old, Ronald and Catherine Berndt arrived for a visit to Wave Hill Station and reported the inhumane working and living conditions of the Aboriginal people living there; additionally they noted that children under 12, like Wavehill, were employed illegally as stockmen.

Wavehill continued working as a stockman, for no pay, until the Wave Hill walk-off, where he and his people protested not only their living and working conditions but also began their fight for Land Rights.

Wavehill was quoted as saying of the Blackfellows Knob Massacre, at Tartarr, that:

Although he remembered past atrocities he did not generalise his opinion of kartiya (non-Indigenous people) and he said that there "were bad kartiya and good kartiya, bad ngumpin (Aboriginal people) and good ngumpin.

Legacy Wavehill was quoted by Pat Dodson in his censure motion against Fraser Anning following the Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand.