It was after noticing the lack of diversity on his local council that the Hon Chansey Paech MLA [pron. Chan-see Pake] decided to nominate to serve his local community in Central Australia. A message for Gwoja!

The first openly gay Indigenous Member of Parliament in Australia, Chansey was elected to Alice Springs Town Council in 2012.

In 2016 he was voted to represent the electorate of Namatjira, becoming a member of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly - serving as Deputy Speaker and Chairman of Committees.

Addressing the chamber in his maiden parliamentary speech that October he said,

“I am young, I am gay, I am Black; a true blue Territorian.”
I am a proud face of the diversity and future of the great Australian Labor Party. [And] I am eternally proud of who I am and where I come from.”

In 2020 Chansey became the first Indigenous Speaker of an Australian Parliament and was voted represent the bush electorate of Gwoja that same year.