Dear Scott Morrison,
You’ve probably guessed that this is not fan mail. I’m sure you do have fans, but I don’t think there would be many game enough to admit it after your recent behaviour. Trolls perhaps, but not people. Why not people, you may ask? Succinctly, because no person with a shred of humanity, the sort of humanity needed to qualify as a human, could ever condone what you are doing to the world’s desperate asylum seekers who come to Australia begging for help.
Before you ready your list of excuses as to why it’s justifiable for someone to be murdered inside an Australian detention facility, there is no justifiable excuse you could possibly provide that will go anywhere near being a justifiable excuse. According to witness reports, a man has died after having his throat cut and sustaining head injuries. His name was Reza Berati. He had a family and friends who loved him. He had a personality. He had a whole life ahead of him. And he was murdered. With violence most compassionate people wouldn’t accept against an animal. A man was murdered. There’s no other way to describe it. You did not carry out the violence, but you were in charge of the person who did, and you were responsible for the victim, Reza Berati since he was in your care.
In the statement you snuck out on Saturday night in the most spineless of fashion, you admitted that your previous statement was based on incorrect information. We are experienced enough with your character to know that we will never find out what you knew and what you didn’t know when you released the wrong information. But I would like to point out that, even if you were personally misled, and you went with the information that was available to you, then you might not be as evil as it would appear, but you certainly are incompetent. So what is it Scott? Are you guilty of making up the first statement or are you incompetent in taking someone else’s word for it without endeavouring to find out the truth? Surely, in this situation, the truth would have been easy to find. If an asylum seeker was killed outside of the Manus Island detention centre, there would have been evidence of this. Because the crime scene, which I presume you are treating as such, would have been outside of the boundary of the detention centre? Or are you claiming you don’t know where this boundary is? This is becoming a bit of a pattern of not-knowing – the Navy apparently also did not know where the Indonesian maritime border was, on several occasions.
And we all know why you changed the official record. It was not because you respected the truth and wanted it to be known. And definitely not because you deeply regretted what you were finding out and wanted to make it clear how badly you felt about it. Because you didn’t feel bad about it. That’s obvious from what you have said and how you have said it. Tony Abbott has even congratulated you for the part you have played in this murder. And that’s the most immoral part of this situation. You’re proud of yourselves for being ‘uncompromising’ and ‘tough’ as if this is a chess game and your strategy has been successful. Think about that for a moment Scott. Someone is dead. Someone has been killed and many others horrifically injured in violent, hauntingly terrifying situation and you are proud of yourself. What is wrong with you Scott? This is not a game. This is Australia’s humanity being denigrated forever. Because you are doing this in our name.
However you try to play down this situation, it’s never going to work. Not just because the UN is now involved, and you’re destroying Australia’s human rights reputation on an international scale. No, it’s far worse than that. The worst of it is that this situation was no accident. When people drown at sea on their way to seek refuge in Australia, their loss of life is just as devastating as the loss of Reza Berati. And when young men installing insulation are killed because their bosses don’t train them how to do their job safely, their loss of life is just as devastating as the loss of Reza Berati. But the difference with this death was that it was no accident. It wasn’t just one out-of-control person carrying out violence in an otherwise well run operation. Ever since you started your crusade to ‘stop the boats’, you made it clear you would do that by whatever means possible. And this murder has been part of that. This murder is the only place your ‘stop the boats’ strategy could go.
Before you think you can wash your hands of this, I want you to know that this is not going away. Murdoch might want everyone to forget, but we are not going to forget. And we are not going to forgive until you do the only thing you could possibly do to fully apologise for this crime by resigning from Australia’s Parliament. Reza Berati deserved better. His family and loved ones deserved better. Tony Abbott said proudly that you are not a wimp. But what he forgot to mention in this character assessment is that you might not be a wimp, but you’re also an evil, untrustworthy fool. And Australia deserves to have better people representing us.
Yours sincerely
Victoria Rollison
