EDITORIAL 

     Thursday, July 10, 1997

     Grey Panther 

     IT MAY be that Mr Lorenzo Kom'Boa Ervin will be obliged to leave Australia. But
     if that happens it will not be because Ms Pauline Hanson thinks he's "a known
     terrorist and gun-runner" or that the Prime Minister thinks "someone with that sort
     of background ought not remain in Australia". Or even that the Acting Immigration
     Minister, Senator Vanstone, has declared him a person not of good character. The
     only reason Mr Ervin should be deported is if he deliberately and seriously breached
     immigration procedures.

     There is doubt about that. Mr Howard said on Monday that Mr Ervin "used a
     different surname" and "misrepresented his past when he applied for a visa". But
     Mr Ervin denies using a false name. He admits he did not fill in the space on the
     entry form requiring disclosure of his criminal record, but says that was inadvertent.
     It is important to know whether he deliberately breached a serious requirement of
     the Immigration Act and whether the Immigration Department itself has acted
     properly. The court proceedings precipitated by Senator Vanstone's dramatic
     exercise of ministerial power on Tuesday should clarify both these issues.

     Meanwhile, the suggestion that Mr Ervin, because of his background, should never
     have been given a visa is being used as though it settles his fate. It is disconcerting to
     hear Mr Howard making such a broad condemnation of Mr Ervin, especially as he
     appears to do this mainly in response to Ms Hanson's shrill finger-pointing. Mr
     Ervin is a former member of the Black Panthers, a militant black organisation active
     in the United States many years ago. In 1969 he took part in an aircraft hijacking to
     Cuba. He was jailed, paroled in 1983 and, his lawyer says, given executive
     clemency under the Bush Administration.

     Australia has a powerful interest in seeing criminals do not come here. But Mr
     Ervin, invited by a little-known local anarchist group, Angry People, for a
     four-week lecture tour, hardly poses a threat. Hijacking is a very serious offence,
     but the one he was involved in occurred a long time ago and Mr Ervin has served his
     time. If there were doubts about his entry procedure, they could have been dealt
     with quietly. Instead, the Government seems to have overreacted badly - and, what
     is worse, in response to Ms Hanson's posturing. Mr Ervin, a Grey Panther at worst,
     has been martyred and so been given far more attention than if the Government had
     shown a cooler head.