Former NT politician Marion Scrymgour has been endorsed today as the preselected ALP candidate for Lingiari, currently held by Warren Snowdon.
Federal Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese says she was preselected “with overwhelming support in a rank and file ballot of the Northern Territory Australian Labor Party.
“Marion Scrygmour is an experienced and committed community leader and will be a formidable addition to the Labor team,” he says.
Ms Scrymgour was the Labor Party Deputy Chief Minister of the Northern Territory from November 2007 until February 2009, and was the highest-ranked Indigenous woman in government in Australia’s history.
She was also the first Indigenous woman to be elected to the Northern Territory Parliament.
Following her retirement from Territory politics in 2012 Ms Scrymgour returned to Wurli Wurlinjang Aboriginal Corporation as its CEO. She was elected chairperson of the Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance Northern Territory.
In November 2013 she was awarded an honorary doctorate in health sciences by the University of Sydney, the first Aboriginal recipient of such an honour from the Faculty of Health Sciences, says Mr Albanese.
In March 2019 she was appointed CEO of the Northern Land Council and became the first woman CEO of any land council in the Northern Territory.
Photo: Ms Scymgour as CEO of the NLC, from their website.
Power move. CLP going to have their work cut out for them now.