Right-wing activists have held a protest outside a Melbourne shopping centre where African gang violence exploded last week and prompted the fast-tracking of a ban on machete sales.
About 30 members of the National Socialist Network (NSN), all in black masks or balaclavas, stood in front of Northland Shopping Centre in Preston on Saturday night with a banner saying “Ban n*ggers, not machetes”.
Video of the demonstration shows the black-clad activists chanting “White man, fight back” three times while lined up under the Northland sign.
Northland was put in lockdown at about 2.30pm last Sunday after a clash between rival gangs, and disturbing images of an African thug wielding a machete sparked public outrage.
Seven male youths – all alleged gang members and known to police – have since been charged. Six were allegedly out on bail at the time, including a 15-year-old and and an 18-year-old who police allege are part of an predominantly African gang known as the 8rs.
That same afternoon four machete-wielding Africans stabbed a teenager on the doorstep of a stranger’s doorstep in Wyndham Vale, and are still on the run.
On Monday Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan responded by banning the sale of machetes, bringing the measure forward from September 1 when a full ban will begin.
Ms Allan announced the ban in March after series of shocking alleged machete crimes, many involving African gangs, and from September machetes will be classified as a prohibited weapon and a three-month amnesty will be put in place.
Just days later a disturbing video emerged of a teenager holding a machete to another boy’s throat at a McDonald’s in the suburb of Truganina on Monday. Four teenagers were arrested over the incident and a 15-year-old was charged but released on bail.
Thousands of Australians responded to the machete ban by calling it a “band aid solution” and demanding mass deportations instead.
African, Afghan, Middle Eastern, Pacific Islander and Burmese gangs have been involved in dozens of alleged violent incidents in recent years in Melbourne, and in 2024 Africans made up about 50% of those in youth detention despite being less than 1% of the population.
Victoria Police stopped publishing the nationality of offenders in crime statistics in 2018 after teaming up with the corporate media and immigrant community groups to deny there was an African gang crisis.
The then-deputy police commissioner Shane Patton, who was later promoted to Chief Commissioner during the state’s draconian Covid lockdowns, said at the time that the there was no African gang problem because “networked criminal offenders” were not technically “gangs”.
The last available crime statistics showed that Sudan and South Sudan-born offenders were overrepresented in crime statistics by a factor of 10 – committing 1.1% of the offences despite being 0.1% of the Victorian population.
They also committed 3.8% of aggravated burglaries, 8.5% of aggravated robberies, 1.5% of car thefts, 1.2% of common assaults, 4.9% of riot and affray offences, 1.8% of serious assaults, and 0.7% of sexual offences in the state.
Header image: The NSN protest outside Northland Shopping Centre (supplied).
