Statement to be attributed to AFLPA CEO, Paul Marsh:

“The AFL Players’ Association joins North Melbourne Football Club in condemning the racist comments made by a former AFL-listed player over the weekend.

We offer our full private and public support to Heritier Lumumba after these hurtful and divisive comments. Racism is abhorrent and the ongoing attacks are hurtful, divisive and need to stop.

Over the past few weeks we have once again seen many of our game’s Indigenous and Multicultural players talk of the pain and damage caused by racism.

We have all heard this plea to our industry, and society, to pick up the fight to eradicate racism, and yet it doesn’t feel like we are moving forward.

We all need to be better. To do more.

We will continue to call out racism when we see it. To educate ourselves and others. And commit to working with our industry until we to eradicate racism from our game.

There is no room for racism.”

-Ends-