The Mabo Centre Story
Established in 2025, the Mabo Centre exists to empower Traditional Owners and their representative groups to maximise the economic, social and cultural benefits of their land and sea rights.
Through research translation, structured training, and knowledge exchange, the Centre supports Traditional Owners to overcome barriers to navigating native title and empowers future generations to drive change within their communities.
A place for and of Traditional Owners from across Australia and the Torres Strait, culture is embedded in our processes and lived by our people, creating strong and independent leadership in the native title sector.
The Mabo Centre carries the name of Indigenous land rights activist and Meriam man Eddie Koiki Mabo. Generously gifted to the Centre by senior Mabo family members, the Mabo Centre carries forward Eddie Mabo's legacy of Indigenous empowerment, land and sea justice, and the ongoing fight for Indigenous rights and recognition in Australia.
Our People
The Mabo Centre is led by, and established from,
Governed by respected First Nations leaders and academics including Professor Rodney Carter, Jamie Lowe, Professor Marcia Langton, and Professor Paul Kofman, the Mabo Centre empowers Traditional Owners and their representative groups to maximise the economic, social and cultural benefits of their land and sea rights.
Partners
Imagery
Gail Mabo
Meriam, Australia, born 1965
Mabo, 2024, Mixed media on canvas
“In honour of my father this is my first mixed media artwork titled Mabo.
Through this work I wanted to convey the extraordinary memory of Edward Koiki Mabo’s fight and pay tribute to his culture and the importance of cultural connection to the place he called home, the Island of ‘Mer’. The law of the Malo was the power of proof of cultural connection to Country.
"Benny Mabo, my Father was the Sixteenth generation and I'm Koiki Mabo, Seventh generation of proud warriors who conquered and settled in Mer."
The words on the canvas demonstrate his unending dedication towards a fight that ultimately took his physical life however now live eternally through his handwritten words.
Reflected in his last diary entry is his profound love for his wife Bonita Mabo the most beautiful woman in his life, his dearly beloved children and his people.
This man fought with sheer determination to achieve the most important fight for Indigenous Australia to the highest court in the land and won.
This man is called Eddie Koiki Mabo.”
