Te Rūnanga-ā-Iwi o Ngāti Kahu
Land Claims Report for April 2010
- Four iwi response to Ngāti Kahu withdrawal from Te Hiku Forum
- Preparing Our Ngāti Kahu Deed of Settlement, working hui 26 March Tātai Hono marae
- Consultation hui Sydney 30-31 March, Brisbane 30 April – 1 May.
- Hui-ā-iwi for hakapapa and wāhi tapu, Kauhanga marae 14-16 April
- Te Ana o Taite – protection from desecration and destruction of Te Whānau Moana’s wāhi tapu
- Foreshore and Seabed replacement legislation … more battling… National government consultation 9 May at Ngā Tai Tokorua, Taipā School 7pm to 9pm
- National Iwi Leaders Forum, Ōnuku marae, Akaroa, Banks Peninsula, 8-9 May, invitation to address Te Arawa Lakes Trust 20 April
Summary
We received acknowledgement that Ngāti Kahu has withdrawn from Te Hiku Forum until our Deed of Settlement is completed. Each member of the team has continued working on their part of our Deed of Settlement. The two hui in Sydney went ahead and the next two in Brisbane have been organized for 1 May. Te Kauhanga marae is currently hosting a three day hui (14-16 April) on hakapapa and shared interests. The government has produced proposals for legislation to replace the Foreshore and Seabed Act and is currently holding consultation hui around the country. The National Iwi Chairs Forum meets again in May.
- Four iwi response to Ngāti Kahu withdrawal from Te Hiku Forum
We have yet to receive acknowledgement from the mandated bodies for Te Rarawa, Ngāti Kurī, Ngāi Takoto and Te Aupōuri of our letter withdrawing from Te Hiku Forum.
Instead “Te Hiku Forum” sent a letter signed off five negotiators from those four iwi (two from Te Rarawa) acknowledging our right to withdraw, looking forward to our return and indicating that they are continuing to pursue an agenda which looks very much like the one the Crown directed in February. They have continued to notify us of meetings, including negotiations meetings they are holding, apparently as Te Hiku Forum, with the Crown.
Although the use of the name Te Hiku Forum implies Ngāti Kahu involvement and agreement, Ngāti Kahu has had no involvement since the signing of the AIP and none of these meetings with the Crown can bind Ngāti Kahu. We retain a right of veto over any arrangements/agreements/undertakings the other four iwi may attempt to enter into with the Crown on our behalf and will certainly exercise it if the Crown continues to dictate to the other iwi about matters affecting Ngāti Kahu.
2. Preparing Our Ngāti Kahu Deed of Settlement, working hui 26 March Tātai Hono marae
Following on from our working meetings last month, each of the team reported back on the progress they had made on their sections at our hui on 26 March. There is a lot of work involved just pulling together a lot of material that has already been written and published over the years. Drafting of the legal sections around the structure, transfer mechanisms and settlement legislation will need a lot of work too. We followed up on all the tasks to make sure we covered everything. As a result Te Ikanui interviewed several marae representatives about their marae and hapū pepeha and place names at the last Rūnanga hui.
The historical account is in the process of being edited and once that is completed we’ll be calling in our translators (Reremoana and co.).
Getting photos of the lands being returned and those still to be returned, and particularly of wāhi tapu is much easier these days with digital cameras. Can whānau please email the photos of their rohe they would like included in the Deed of Settlement to Bardia at the office (b.matiu@xtra.co.nz).
- Consultation hui Sydney 30-31 March, Brisbane 30 April – 1 May.
The two hui in Sydney were held in Redfern and in Casula. Some of our team went ahead to make sure that organization was completed. About 40 people in all attended both hui, including whanaunga that most of us had not seen for many years. McCully Matiu’s son Warren (Knuckle) and his family attended and that was particularly poignant for the team. All those who attended were extremely grateful for the information, and asked if we could come back.
Arrangements for the Brisbane trip are now complete. We fly into Brisbane on Friday, 30 April, do two presentations on Saturday 1 May in different parts of Brisbane and fly home on Sunday.
4. Hui-ā-iwi for hakapapa and wāhi tapu, Kauhanga marae 14-16 April
This hui is taking place as I write. Canon Lloyd Popata and Niki Tauhara are leading discussions on our Ngāti Kahu hakapapa and how best to protect all our wāhi tapu, particularly those on private land. A mapping expert is attending this hui to help us map our wāhi tapu and we are hoping to do some detailed mapping of Maungataniwha. Wāhi tapu in other hapū’s rohe also need to be identified and mapped.
5. Te Ana o Taite – protection from desecration and destruction of Te Whānau Moana’s wāhi tapu
Evidence has now been filed by all parties as the Rūnanga, acting on instructions from Te Whānau Moana, battles Carrington Farms to stop them building 12 houses on top of Te Ana o Taite, the very large wāhi tapu just south along Karikari beach from Wairahoraho stream. It is very clear that Carrington Farms has treated the out of court settlement sealed in the High Court in 2001, the hohou rongo ceremony conducted by Rev. Timoti Flavell and the site visit to all Te Whānau Moana’s wāhi tapu on the lands occupied by Carrington farms, including Te Ana o Taite, as if they mean nothing. This case is highlighting how determined developers are to bulldoze mana whenua out of their way in their relentless pursuit of monetary profits – shades of Avatar.
6. Foreshore and Seabed replacement legislation – more battling… National government consultation 9 May at Ngā Tai Tokorua, Taipā School 7pm to 9pm
The government has issued the Crown’s Foreshore and Seabed Consultation Document and has set a deadline of 30 April 2010 for submissions. In the meantime the Attorney-General, Chris Finlayson, is conducting consultation hui around the country. The hui for Te Hiku o te Ika will be held at Ngā Tai Tokorua, the multicultural hall at Taipā School on Sunday 9 May from 4pm to 7pm. I will be attending the National Iwi Chairs hui that day but urge as many as are able to attend this hui and remind Chris that all the foreshore and seabed in Ngāti Kahu’s territories belong to the hapū of Ngāti Kahu.
I indicated last month that cabinet would probably not allow Chris Finlayson to make sure that the proposal meets the basic requirements that our mana whenua is encapsulated in law as ultimate ownership (tupuna title), that the foreshore and seabed cannot be sold and that access for all is protected. The consultation document confirms that Chris could not achieve these requirements. The government proposal, like the previous government’s Foreshore and Seabed Act, is fatally flawed because it starts at the wrong place. It wrongly assumes that the Crown rather than Māori must control the foreshore and seabed and the Crown has the right to determine what interests Māori may or may not have. It talks of a preferred ‘public domain’ option where “no-body owns the foreshore and seabed” but where the Crown still determines who controls it. The proposal is a ridiculous attempt to hood-wink Māori into freely relinquishing our mana whenua / mana moana to the Crown.
Until we have a government who is prepared to accept the facts as they are, that is, that Māori have been here for many centuries before Pākehā set foot here, that the entire country is ours and we have never allowed anyone to take our foreshore and seabed, then we are battling a lie and a government prepared to keep perpetuating the lie.
It is the Crown, on behalf of non-Māori, who has to prove to us that it has any legitimate rights in the foreshore and seabed – we have nothing to prove to them. It is the Crown who must come and ask us for the right to use our takutai moana – we do not have to ask them to use what is already ours. This government assuming that the Crown has some superior right to tell us what to do with our own foreshore and seabed is pure racism and cannot be tolerated. Their only role is to engage in discussion with the holders of mana whenua around the coast throughout the country, that is, the hapū, to reach agreement with its true owners on what can and cannot take place in the country’s foreshore and seabed.
The National Iwi Chairs Forum working group on the foreshore and seabed provided a detailed analysis of the proposal indicating that it does “not satisfy the rights, expectations and values of iwi and hapū”.
Listening to Chris Finlayson, on TV3’s The Nation programme, I am confident that he understands what our mana whenua is and what is right, but is frantically juggling the politics of racism and some pretty abhorrent law that has already been enacted as he tries to reach a compromise. But a compromise that denies our mana whenua, as the proposal does, is not a compromise and will not work.
Our declaration of mana whenua / mana moana was publicly notified last week and states that we hold mana whenua / mana moana throughout all our lands and seas. It is attached to this report.
Last month I reported the suggestion that the Act be repealed and replaced by a commission with a membership made up of half Māori, half Crown and chaired by Māori, and that it be charged with implementing the three principles of Māori or (preferably) tupuna title, no sale and public access assured nationally in a manner that addresses the mana whenua of each hapū around the coast. I am hearing that being discussed and expect that the Iwi Chairs Forum will discuss it on 8 May.
7. National Iwi Leaders Forum, Ōnuku marae, Akaroa, Banks Peninsula, 8-9 May, invitation to address Te Arawa Lakes Trust 20 April
Notification has just been received of this National Iwi Chairs Forum hui hosted by Ngāi Tahu which was set down at the Haruru Falls hui in February.
The agenda follows the one we set last time and covers updates on the Foreshore and Seabed, Water, Emissions Trading Scheme, Whānau Ora, Constitutional Change and Private Public Partnerships.
Mining on the conservation estate has been identified as a strategic issue for discussion and Sonny Tau will speak on Ngāpuhi’s Te Tiriti claim.
I have received a request from Te Arawa Lakes Trust to come and explain the role and purpose of the National Iwi Chairs Forum. I received the same request from the Law School at the University of Auckland for a Symposium on the constitution they held in February and prepared a presentation then. I will give the same presentation to Te Arawa next Tuesday night at Tamatekapua marae at 5.30pm.
Professor Margaret Mutu
15 April 2010