Police say they are treating the theft and vandalism of statues in Ballarat's Prime Ministers Avenue as a "political statement" after an image of the two stolen busts emerged on social media.
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The image, posted to an Instagram profile on January 26, 2025, depicts a person dressed in black, holding a sledgehammer and crouching on the Australian flag.
The masked figure is holding the upturned bust of Paul Keating in their left hand, while their knee is resting on that of Kevin Rudd.
An accompanying caption says the photo was submitted to the profile anonymously.
"Victoria Police say return the heads? We say return the land to its rightful owners!" the caption states.
"The colony is falling."
Ballarat Police Acting Inspector Brad Hall said investigators were treating the image as legitimate, but it would be referred to the City of Ballarat, the statue's owners, who would be best placed to comment on its authenticity.
"It's disappointing to see that someone has got such little regard for the wellbeing of the Ballarat community," he said.
"Knowing full well the emotions that their actions have created, to have a complete disregard for that is quite disappointing."
The two busts were stolen from Ballarat Botanical Gardens in the early hours of January 23, 2025, in an incident where most other prime minister statues were also damaged or spray painted with red crosses.
Police say an angle grinder was used to remove the busts of the two former prime ministers, and they are looking to identify four occupants of a silver ute that was caught on CCTV footage.
It's estimated it will cost more than $140,000 to restore the statues in the Prime Ministers Avenue.
Why do police say the vandalism was politically motivated?
The vandalism of Ballarat's Prime Ministers Avenue was one of several incidents targeting statues across the country in the lead-up to Australia Day 2025.
In Melbourne, a war memorial was covered in red paint and a monument honouring one of the city's founders, John Batman, was cut in half.
While in Sydney, a statue of Captain James Cook was damaged and splattered with red paint and a memorial to police killed in the line of duty was graffitied with the words "evil" and "dogs".
In recent years, statues celebrating colonial figures have frequently been targeted by activists, and authorities have attempted to address the violent legacy of certain figures.
The statue of John Batman, who participated in the murder of Aboriginal people in Tasmania in the early 1800s, has previously had plaques added to it which state Indigenous people occupied the land prior to him founding Melbourne.
The Instagram profile to which the image of Ballarat's Prime Minister busts was posted states it is "against straya", a commonly used slang term for Australia, and speaks against colonialism.
Mr Hall said while the vandalism appeared to be politically motivated, police weren't expecting further attacks.
"It's hard to be able to get into the mindset of somebody who's going to do something so mindless," he said.
"We're always considering the possibility there will be further [incident] but there's nothing to suggest this is going to be an ongoing thing.
"This looks like it was a political statement, but then I go back to say that [it was] with complete disregard for the harm they've done to the Ballarat community."
Mr Hall said investigators were still working on multiple leads and that they wanted to review more CCTV from the morning of January 23.
"We're still keen for people to have a look at their CCTV from that period of time ... and if they see anything that suggests that anything's out of the ordinary, to let us know via Crime Stoppers," he said.
In a statement to The Courier, City of Ballarat mayor Tracey Hargreaves said the council was aware of the image but could not comment further as the investigation was ongoing.
