This book brings together a series of annual reviews of issues affecting Māori that have been published over the past fifteen years. In 1994, the editor of The Contemporary Pacific, a journal of Pacific Island affairs published out of the Centre for Pacific Island Studies at the University of Hawai’i (Mānoa), asked me to provide a review of issues affecting Māori over the past year. Ranginui Walker had been providing annual reviews for the journal for several years and wanted to pass the role over to me. There was plenty to write about; during 1994 and 1995 Māori were once again at loggerheads with the New Zealand government, this time as we battled them over their iniquitous fiscal envelope policy for settling Treaty of Waitangi claims. So I agreed, and found it cathartic to be able to review and record our experiences over the previous twelve months, having participated in many hui not only amongst my own people of Te Hiku o te Ika (the Far North) but also on marae throughout the country. I had been actively involved in our own land issues and then our Treaty claims for nearly two decades and had the benefit of many hours of discussion with my own Ngāti Kahu kaumātua and kuia, as well as many others around the country, about what was happening to the Māori world.
Issues and events as viewed through Māori eyes
Every year after that The Contemporary Pacific asked me to review the previous twelve months from July to the following June and that format has been retained here. Every year there were far more issues and events to report on than could be included in the review. Those I included were those I had heard being discussed on marae, in other hui, in Māori news media such as Mana magazine and on the Māori radio stations which had operated since the 1980s and then, since 2004, on Māori Television. Even so there were still several important issues that I did not cover. The approach I took was to try to capture as best I could the wide range of thinking expressed by Māori on issues and events affecting us as Māori. And while many of the events and issues I reviewed were covered in the mainstream (Pākehā) media, the way they were reported there rarely, if ever, reflected Māori thought on the matter.
Approach based on He Whakaputanga and Te Tiriti
My approach was strongly influenced by the teachings of my kaumātua. Much of what I reviewed dealt with our relationship with Pākehā and the ongoing struggle to free ourselves of their domination, oppression and discrimination. For my kaumātua, the relationship we entered into with the British in the nineteenth century was that set out first in He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni: The Declaration of Independence of 1835, where our mana and tino rangatiratanga – our sovereignty, our ultimate authority, control and ownership of the country – was recognised and confirmed, followed by the formalisation in Te Tiriti o Waitangi of our relationship with the tino rangatira, the ultimate chief of the British: the Crown.1 Both those documents solemnly undertook that our mana and tino rangatiratanga would be upheld and respected by the British Crown if we allowed her subjects to live amongst us on our lands and, in Te Tiriti, that the British Crown would take responsibility for and govern over her own hitherto lawless subjects who had already arrived in, and would continue to come to, Aotearoa-New Zealand. Te Tiriti also guaranteed that the British Crown would guard against Māori being harmed by the lawless behaviour of her subjects.
Yet the British Crown has never been able to control her own subjects who came to live in our land, and for far too long they behaved in a manner that severely demeaned not only her mana, but also that of her descendants right down to today. For my kaumātua, setting that relationship right and, in doing so, upholding both He Whakaputanga and Te Tiriti, were the single most important aims they pursued in respect of our relationships with Pākehā and passed on to my generation to pursue after them.2 Many of the events and issues reviewed in this book came about as a result of numerous and repeated violations not only of the official and internationally authoritative Māori language treaty, Te Tiriti o Waitangi, but also its English version, the Treaty of Waitangi.3
The underlying problem of racism in New Zealand
The underlying cause of the violations of Te Tiriti was invariably racism, that deeply embedded notion of white supremacy which imbued the incoming British with a belief that they could dispossess Māori as and however they chose. Racism can be defined as the attitudinal or ideological phenomenon that accepts racial superiority, and, when present in those with power, justifies them using that power to discriminate against and deprive others of what is rightfully theirs on the basis of their race.4 It arrived in New Zealand with the first European visitors and remains to this day. Moana Jackson, writing for Mana magazine, explains: ‘… colonisation after 1492 was based on the belief of most of the White States in Europe that they had a right to dispossess most of the non-White Indigenous Peoples of the world. Colonisation was driven by racism, and efforts to “improve” race relations in this country will fail unless we address that, and try to deal with the constitutional, social and economic injustices which it creates’.5
Racial discrimination was not formally outlawed in New Zealand until 1971 with the passing of the Race Relations Act. However the main reason for passing the law was so that New Zealand could ratify the United Nations’ International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. While the Office of the Race Relations Conciliator established by that Act conducted various education programmes aimed at reducing overt racism, it was unable to cure the deep-seated prejudice that had seen the country proudly adhering to a White New Zealand policy until the Second World War.6 As such, racial prejudice against Māori, and particularly institutionalised racism,7 continues to be widely practised by many Pākehā institutions and large numbers of New Zealand Pākehā, who are well represented in Parliament. One past prime minister, Sir Geoffrey Palmer, commented to a conference of judges, lawyers and Māori leaders (convened to discuss ‘Treaty Claims: The Unfinished Business’ a few days after the Waitangi Day debacle at Waitangi in 1995) that racism remains the ‘unpleasant underside to the New Zealand psyche whenever there is debate of Māori matters’.8 Māori efforts to combat racism are usually met with denial of its existence and personal threats to those who dare to raise the issue publicly.
From 1994 to 2009, common issues and themes reocurred. The work of the Waitangi Tribunal has involved many thousands of Māori throughout the country as we fight to take back our lands and resources. It is rare for the Tribunal not to uphold our claims, and its reports largely rewrite the history of the country. Yet Pākehā find it unbearably painful to have to come to terms with the true history of this country and react angrily to being told that their claims to ownership and control are not legitimate.
The Waitangi Tribunal – Te Roopu Whakamana i te Tiriti o Waitangi – was set up in 1975 under the Treaty of Waitangi Act as a permanent commission of inquiry, to inquire into and make recommendations on alleged breaches of the ‘principles’ of the Treaty of Waitangi.9 For the first eight years of its existence it was ineffectual, rejecting Joe Hawke’s fisheries regulations claim, and seeing only seven claims registered by the end of 1983. Then in 1983, three years after Edward Taihākurei Durie,10 a Māori, was appointed to chair the Tribunal, the Motunui-Waitara report11 was released. It upheld Te Ātiawa’s claim in respect of the likely pollution of traditional fishing reefs near Waitara by the proposed Synfuel plant if it went ahead. Then in 1984, and again in 1985, Māori proprietary rights and environmental concerns were upheld in the Kaituna River and Manukau Harbour claims.12 In 1986 the Tribunal recommended that te reo Māori be given the status of an official language.13
In 1985 the Tribunal’s jurisdiction was expanded to allow it to inquire into claims back to 1840. Its membership was also expanded to seventeen in 1988 as claims started increasing in number. Specific provision was made for approximately equal numbers of Māori and Pākehā members, with a kaumātua usually appointed to each inquiry.14 The Tribunal went on to uphold numerous historical claims to lands taken by the Crown throughout the country in violation of the Treaty.15 It was the investigations and subsequent reports into these claims, which challenged the legitimacy of Pākehā settlement in New Zealand, that created the significant Pākehā backlash.16 The Tribunal came under threat as politicians sought to abolish it or downgrade its powers, particularly those to make binding recommendations in respect of Crown forest and state-owned enterprise lands. The threat of the removal of these powers should they ever be used has hung over the Tribunal ever since.17
The fiscal envelope – side-stepping the Tribunal to extinguish Treaty claims
In an effort to marginalise both the Tribunal and the Treaty, and to extinguish Māori claims, the National Party government in 1994 launched its discriminatory fiscal envelope policy for settling Treaty of Waitangi claims by Māori. Despite its total rejection by Māori, successive governments have clung to it, imposing many ‘settlements’ in the last fifteen years on various tribal groupings desperate to rise above the poverty and deprivation they have suffered for over a century. The disruption and divisions amongst Māori caused by the Crown’s ‘settlement’ activities have been widespread and featured in my writing repeatedly over the years.
The fisheries allocation debacle
The longest-running dispute was that over the fisheries settlement allocation. It dragged on for more than eleven years after the Waitangi Tribunal produced its report, with allocation only taking place after iwi throughout the country had become exhausted fighting the gross injustices perpetrated by the settlement. It became another theme, featuring throughout the reviews up until 2003.
Racism against Māori in New Zealand is perpetuated and encouraged by Pākehā media. Numerous examples of it occurred over the years and it too became a recurring theme throughout the book.
Those who have perhaps suffered most publicly from racist attacks are those of our MPs who are proud to acknowledge their Māori descent. Prior to 1996 there were very few Māori in Parliament and they were largely invisible, marginalised and unable to speak out for their people. In 1996, the year of the first MMP election, fifteen MPs of Māori descent entered the House. Media attacks on them were merciless from the outset and eventually resulted in all but one or two of them maintaining very low profiles and remaining marginalised. This was another recurring theme until 2005, when the Māori Party won four seats and became the first independent voice of Māori in the New Zealand Parliament. From 2005 Parliament reeled under repeated onslaughts from the Māori Party publicly attacking racism against Māori whenever it occurred. But it still took three years and a government staring down inevitable defeat in the 2008 general election before Māori started to see any significant changes of attitude.
International criticism of government treatment of Māori
The government’s ongoing racism and discrimination against Māori has not gone unnoticed in international circles. Another reoccurring theme is the United Nations’ criticism and increasing condemnation of the treatment of Māori in New Zealand that has resulted in many Māori immigrating to Australia. For years the New Zealand government has reported to the United Nations that race relations in New Zealand are good and that only a few non-representative radical Māori were saying otherwise. Yet the facts speak for themselves in respect of Māori poverty, deprivation and marginalisation, and when the New Zealand government voted against the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007 it could no longer sustain its ‘good race relations’ façade. In the year following the period covered in this book, in April 2010, the Māori Party finally persuaded the New Zealand government to support the Declaration. While Māori were jubilant that their human rights were now formally recognised, the Prime Minister played down its significance and was dismissive of its potential impact.18
Along the way we lost many great leaders and icons. While it was not possible to note all our leaders who had passed on I have reported on those who had made particularly noteworthy and valuable contributions towards our struggle for freedom from oppression.
And in amongst the gloom and depression we always look for the bright spots, the great successes – the great Māori international sporting and fashion achievements, an award-winning film about us, an amazing survival against impossible odds, Māori Television and so on. I have included far too few of these but where we have had cause to celebrate a truly exceptional Māori achievement, I have recorded it.
In compiling the reviews for this book I have significantly expanded several of them in order to provide background material. I have also added in references to allow the reader to pursue matters in greater detail than I was able to find space for in a book that aims primarily to review issues and events, rather than to provide an in-depth analysis of them.
I am hugely indebted to and wish to thank the very large numbers of my whānau, my kuia and kaumātua, my hapū, Te Whānau Moana, and my iwi, Ngāti Kahu, who trained me and guided me over many years and have been my backbone and shelter as we have fought to maintain, uphold and enhance our mana and tino rangatiratanga. Ahakoa te nui o koutou kua mene atu ki te pō, e kore koutou e warewaretia. Ko tātou ngā kākano i ruia mai i Rangiātea, ā, ka ū, ka mau. Ki a tātou ngā waihotanga iho o rātou mā, ngā mihi whānui, ngā mihi aroha. He taonga tēnei mō koutou me ā koutou tamariki, mokopuna, ngā uri hakatupu.
It was my kuia and kaumātua who first took me outside our own iwi territories and throughout the country to meet and listen to hundreds of our whanaunga who work tirelessly for their whānau, hapū and iwi. It has been an honour to have learnt so much not only in hui, but also in discussions with so many of you over the years, and particularly in respect of the issues and events covered in this book. Tēnei te mihi nui ki a koutou katoa.
To my colleagues over the past three decades in Māori Studies at the University of Auckland who taught me so much about the fascinating world of Western academia and the manner in which it can help us in our pursuit of te mātauranga me māramatanga, and to my colleagues in Māori Studies in all the other New Zealand universities and at our Whare Wānanga, I extend warm greetings and thanks for your tautoko and scholarly fellowship. Our discussions in the various hui we have been able to convene have also been invaluable. Likewise to my colleagues in Hawaiian Studies at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa, Native Studies at the University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada, Native American Studies at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, thank you for your support and assistance as I tried to make more sense of our situation by comparing it to yours.
To Brian and Robyn Bargh and the meticulous editors at Huia Publishers, my thanks for your on-going support and mentoring for this project. For the photographs, ka nui aku mihi ki a Gil Hanly, ki a Katherine Findlay i Mana, ki a Sally Nicholas, ki a Josie McClutchie. Gil’s enthusiasm and patience with my fascination for her marvellous collections of photographs; Katherine’s generous sharing of her extensive knowledge of the Mana photographs; Sally’s painstaking work preparing the photographs; Josie’s technical insights and skills relating to the design. All of immeasurable help as I tried to capture in photographs the determination of Māori to be recognised as the first and indigenous people of Aotearoa-New Zealand and to have our rights upheld. I am also grateful to and thank Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga: the National Māori Centre for Research Excellence for its provision of a publication grant, which assisted in the publication of this work. Thanks also to the Faculty of Arts at the University of Auckland, which also provided financial support.
1 See Appendices 1 and 2.
2 McCully Matiu and Margaret Mutu, 2003, Te Whānau Moana: Ngā Kaupapa me ngā Tikanga: Customs and Protocols, Auckland, Reed, p. 179–181.
3 Margaret Mutu, 2010, ‘Constitutional Intentions: The Treaty of Waitangi Texts’, in Malcolm Mulholland and Veronica Tawhai (eds), Weeping Waters: The Treaty of Waitangi and Constitutional Change, Wellington, Huia Publishers, p. 13–40.
4 Paul Spoonley, 1995, Racism and Ethnicity, Auckland, Oxford University Press, p. 3.
5 Moana Jackson, 1998, ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’, Mana no. 25, December 1997–January 1998, pp. 16–17.
6 Te Ara Encyclopedia of New Zealand, ‘The end of a ‘white New Zealand’ policy’, http://www.teara.govt.nz/NewZealanders/NewZealandPeoples/HistoryOfImmigration/15/en. For an outline of the background and history of racism or White Supremacy in New Zealand see Spoonley, 1995, Racism and Ethnicity; Angela Ballara, 1986, Proud to be White? A Survey of Pakeha Prejudice in New Zealand, Auckland, Heinemann.
7 Ranginui Walker, 2004, Ka Whawhai Tonu Matou: Struggle Without End, Auckland, Penguin, p. 277.
8 Sir Geoffrey Palmer, 1995, ‘Where to from Here?’ in Geoff McLay (ed.), 1995, Treaty Settlements: The Unfinished Business, Wellington, New Zealand Institute of Advanced Legal Studies and Victoria University of Wellington Law Review, p. 151.
9 The Waitangi Tribunal was left to define the principles of the Treaty. However both the Court of Appeal in New Zealand Maori Council v Attorney-General [1987] 1 NZLR 641 in particular, and subsequently the government have also attempted to define the principles (Paul Hamer, 2004, ‘A Quarter-century of the Waitangi Tribunal’, in Janine Haywood and Nicola R Wheen (eds), 2004, The Waitangi Tribunal: Te Roopu Whakamana i te Tiriti o Waitangi, Wellington, Bridget Williams Books, p. 6). Māori on the other hand have argued that the words of the original and internationally authoritative Māori language version of the Treaty, often referred to as Te Tiriti o Waitangi, are what Māori agreed to and as such it is what should be adhered to. This document is eschewed by governments because it states clearly that tino rangatiratanga, which encompasses sovereignty, remains with Māori and that the Crown has a much lesser kāwanatanga or governance role. All New Zealand governments have always asserted the complete sovereignty of Parliament over New Zealand and refused to acknowledge Māori sovereignty.
10 Now the Honourable Doctor Sir Edward Taihākurei Durie.
11 Waitangi Tribunal, 1983, Report of the Waitangi Tribunal on the Motunui-Waitara Claim (Wai 6), Wellington, Waitangi Tribunal, http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/reports/
12 Waitangi Tribunal, 1984, Report of the Waitangi Tribunal on the Kaituna River Claim (Wai 4); 1985, Report of the Waitangi Tribunal on the Manukau Claim (Wai 8), Wellington, Waitangi Tribunal, http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/reports/
13 Waitangi Tribunal, 1986, Report of the Waitangi Tribunal on the Te Reo Maori Claim (Wai 11), Wellington, Waitangi Tribunal, http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/reports/
14 See the website of the Waitangi Tribunal, http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/about/wtmemb/
15 See the Waitangi Tribunal website at http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/reports/ for the large number of reports upholding historical claims.
16 Hamer, ‘A Quarter-century of the Waitangi Tribunal’, p. 7.
17 Hamer, ‘A Quarter-century of the Waitangi Tribunal’, p. 7.
18 Tracy Watkins, 20 April 2010, ‘NZ Does U-turn on Rights Charter’, Stuff: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/3599153/NZ-does-U-turn-on-rights-charter.