The Racial Discrimination Act should be immediately reinstated.
An Aboriginal health lobby group is asking the Federal Government to reconsider its decision to keep compulsory income management as a part of the Northern Territory intervention, against the advice of an independent review panel.
Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance of the Northern Territory spokesperson John Paterson says income management is racially discriminatory and he has likened it to apartheid.
"It's taken us back to the dark old days of the South African apartheid regime," he said.
"I thought we'd come past that era. Aboriginal people in 1967 were given the referendum to vote and the freedom to be treated as Australian citizens."
Mr Paterson says men in the Territory have been screaming out for a response to a health summit held in Alice Springs earlier this year.
He wants the Territory to have programs such as 'Men's Sheds' where men get together, support each other and hear talks by role models.
"We seem to be the forgotten component of this whole intervention," he said.
"Aboriginal men are also in need of the amount of support and programs and services for themselves, that they can have the opportunity to be good fathers and good parents and good role models for Aboriginal communities and Aboriginal families."
One of the communities covered by the intervention has also criticised the decision to keep compulsory income management.
Darwin Bagot Community president Lyle Cooper says the Racial Discrimination Act should be immediately reinstated.
"After going and visiting 31 communities ... all we want to do is be responsible for our actions and roll back intervention in terms of taking back the blanket approach for income management," he said.
He has questioned the purpose of having the review.
"We're at a loss understanding why all this money was spent on a review committee, going in and speaking to us who live the dream at the moment, going back to Canberra and having Prime Minister Rudd and Macklin having our recommendations fall on deaf ears," he said.
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