Under the canopy of an Akubra, Malcolm Turnbull steps onto the tarmac at Tennant Creek Airport to a traditional indigenous welcome.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
No prime minister has visited the region since Malcolm Fraser in 1982 - and he didn't dot his way through throngs of people, expertly snapping selfies.
Yet Turnbull's presence isn't prompted by feel-good politicking.
It comes in response to a flashpoint in a town ravaged by alcohol abuse and where many children are not considered safe: the rape of a two-year-old girl in February.
But Tennant Creek is not a place without hope.
Turnbull appears taken aback when soon-to-be grandmother-of-10 Bonita Thompson explains her situation to him at the Future Stars indigenous training program where she works as a caterer.
She walks six kilometres a day from her tin shed home with no water or electricity just to do her job, she tells him.
"I've been working every day just to get food on the table for my family," she says.
Afterwards, local mayor Steve Edgington addresses an economic development council meeting at the Battery Hill Mining Centre, a relic from the gold industry on which the town once thrived.
Ideas to turn things around include an inland port and rail between Tennant Creek and Mt Isa, 660 kilometres east by road.
"We can't have another generation of unemployed people in Tennant Creek. We need to get people off that cycle of unemployment and poverty," Edgington tells AAP.
Back in the town centre, Turnbull stares up at a mural.
Traditional owner Ronald Plummer stands in front of the wall, which he helped paint in 1990, quietly explaining its significance to the prime minister.
"The landmarks, the protests," Plummer later tells AAP.
Night falls in the desert after Turnbull addresses a dinner, made with the help of Thompson and other cooks in the Future Stars program.
There's an eerie calm as the Youth Night Patrol motorcade rolls through town led by a van with flashing orange lights where the prime minister sits.
Sunday is a dry day. The prime minister isn't exposed to the full force of night in Tennant Creek.
A driver points out a notorious party strip where chaos can erupt but not tonight.
Returning to Battery Hill the next morning, Turnbull is flanked by fellow politicians as he announces a new deal between governments to address deep dysfunction in the region.
"I've not been shocked, I've been inspired," the ever-positive Turnbull says, reflecting on the visit.
After the red dust settles in Tennant Creek, there'll remain hope that awareness will bring change.
Australian Associated Press
