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Backers of the No campaign have held their first event in Canberra with just two weeks left before the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum, pushing back against the "fun feeling of unity" being promoted by those on the Yes side.
Grassroots organisation Black People's Union (BPU) identifies as a "progressive No" movement that opposes the premise of the referendum to enshrine a First Nations Voice in the constitution.
"I don't believe that 97 per cent of the population that's non-Indigenous should be deciding what 3 per cent of the population's political role, as a sovereign people, should be and what our relationship should be with our oppressors," BPU vice-president Leah House said.
The Ngambri woman, 30, said it would be "ignorant" for people to assume the referendum would solve systemic Indigenous disadvantage.
"I don't believe this country is going to magically turn into this post-colonial utopia that some people seem to think we're going to be this united nation," Ms House said.
"We're still going to be dealing with our deaths in custody, the thefts of our land, our children being removed at some of the highest rates — none of that's going to go away."
Around 60 attendees heard from the BPU's speaker panel in Canberra on Saturday, one of the only No events in the nation's capital, which said Australia should be pursuing full self-determination and sovereignty.
Ms House, 30, was worried the federal Voice to Parliament would replicate the shortcomings she associated with the Canberra's official First Nations consulting body.
She was elected to the ACT Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elected Body (ATSIEB) but walked away from her role earlier this year in protest against its operations.
"The ACT government has used the elected body to claim that they have consent and consensus that [local] Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders support the Yes campaign," Ms House said.
"But the elected body cannot speak for the community because it has not held any community consultations during its term."
It comes as the convenors of the Greens' First Nations advisory group released their official position against the Voice on Friday.
"I don't recall ever walking, during my political activism since I was 13, to vote to be in the constitution of the Australian colonial government," national co-convenor Tjanara Goreng Goreng said.
Dr Goreng Goreng, who attended the Uluru Statement convention in 2017, said constitutional recognition should remain separate from the Voice, and the Voice should only exist accompanied by truth and treaty.
"Treaty is actually what we want as a sovereign group of people, because the Commonwealth has never signed a treaty with us."
On the other side of town, a Yes23 barbecue led by Ngunnawal elder Aunty Violet Sheridan urged Canberra's multicultural community to listen to First Nations' needs.
"If we don't get this referendum over the line, it's going to take another 50 years for this to come back to the table again, for a treaty to be discussed," Ms Sheridan said.
"But if we can't get the support for the Yes vote, I don't know what's next."
Aunty Violet said she had been feeling "depressed" about waning support for the referendum but had become optimistic by the turnout at national Walk for Yes earlier this month.
"We expected 1,800 people to walk with us that day, but over 6,000 people walked with us," she said.
"Now I'm reaching out to our young people and our undecided voters. Please stand with us."