Photograph by Belinda Mason OAM 2024, inkjet on brushed aluminium 60cm x 40cm
Boigu Island – Ngai Boeygulaig
Crocodile Clan from the Small Tribe of Boigu. Ngai Koedalaw Augadhalaig, Moegi Buaingu
Torres Strait – Zenadth Kes
Able Seaman
Royal Australian Navy
“I would like to encourage more of our people to join the Australian Defence Force because it has changed my life ever since I’ve made that choice to enlist.”
I was born in 1989 and raised on Thursday Island in the Torres Strait by my father, Donald Banu (Snr), an ex-serviceman and my mother, Etta Banu, who is from Boigu Island. I came from a very small, remote community on Boigu Island, but in 2007, I travelled all the way down to Crib Point in Melbourne, Victoria, to enlist in the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). During my time in the Navy, I served at naval bases HMAS Albatross and HMAS Cairns and on a wide variety of ships, including HMAS Stuart, Darwin, Kanimbla, and HMAS Labuan. I completed my service and discharged in 2010.
I joined the Navy because I wanted to make my father, who was a retired sailor, and my family proud and to be a role model to young people in my community and to the people of the Torres Strait. Four other members of my family have also enlisted in the RAN and two others in the Army reserves. The most recent is my nephew, who graduated from HMAS Cerberus on the 17th May 2024.
Serving in the Australian Defence Force has taught me many values about life in general, taught me to be strong when I am away from family for so many moons, and to be respectful to other people from many different walks of life. I now work as a Senior Police Liaison Officer with the Queensland Police Service (QPS), having given almost 11 years of service to the QPS and my community.
