Special administration start – Githabul Nation Aboriginal Corporation RNTBC

The Registrar of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporations, Ms Tricia Stroud, has placed the Githabul Nation Aboriginal Corporation RNTBC (ICN 4709) under special administration.

On 30 July 2024 the Registrar issued a notice to the corporation to show cause why a special administrator should not be appointed. This action was taken following an examination of the corporation’s books where significant non-compliance issues were identified.

The corporation hadn’t held an annual general meeting for 2021 or 2022. With no AGMs, it also failed to hold director elections resulting in directors holding terms exceeding those permitted by the corporation’s rule book. Further, the corporation had failed to maintain any financial accounts or declare any financial information in its general reports for the financial years 2021, 2022 and 2023. Without appropriate financial management, monitoring or reporting, the corporation may have undercalculated it’s reporting requirements and therefore potentially also failed to provide audited financial reports to the Registrar.

The Registrar has appointed Mr Anthony Jonsson and Mr Matthew Mullen from Grant Thornton Australia Limited as the joint and several special administrators. Their appointment is until 14 March 2025. All board positions have been vacated and the special administrators will conduct the affairs of the corporation.

The special administration will require a significant amount of work to restore proper governance structures and frameworks, and financial management systems to address the matters of non-compliance.

Background

Githabul Nation Aboriginal Corporation RNTBC is based in Kyogle, New South Wales. Its key purpose is to manage the native title rights of the Githabul people and administer over 1,120 square kilometres of land on their behalf. The land is spread across nine national parks and 13 state forests in northern New South Wales.