We hear all the time now about how the calls for Co-governance under the partnership requirements of the Treaty of Waitangi are being made in response to “UNDRIP- United Nations Declaration on Rights of Indigenous Peoples”.

 

The Declaration is an overarching set of standards that were set out to protect indigenous peoples on a global scale.

 

We are also told all the time that Maori are the indigenous people of New Zealand so let’s look at this claim first as it is the basis for all of the claims around Co-Governance etc.

 

The Cambridge dictionary definition of indigenous is as follows:

 

Indigenous

 

Adjective

 

used to refer to, or relating to, the people who originally lived in a place, rather than people who moved there from somewhere else :

used to refer to plants and animals that grow or live naturally in a place, and have not been brought there from somewhere else:

not foreign or from outside an area:

 

So taking from this definition combined with the history of the Maori migrating to New Zealand from Hawai’iki in their canoes we must conclude that the Maori are not indigenous to New Zealand just very early migrants by their own admission.

 

If they, in the face of this evidence, still want to claim to be indigenous then they would have to explain how they became indigenous to New Zealand. What is it about their situation that differs from my own?

 

I am a fifth generation New Zealand born citizen of European ancestry and as far as I can make out the only difference between me and most of the New Zealand born Maori is the date of birth of their ancestors. In other words they are descended from the early Maori migrants who arrived in New Zealand a few generations before mine but this still does not change the fact that they did not originally live in New Zealand.

 

They came from overseas, and by their own admission this means that they do not fit the definition of Indigenous People as set out above.

 

If they could make a convincing argument that they actually are indigenous people to New Zealand then that must mean that I am indigenous as well due to me having the exact same history of being descended from migrants to New Zealand just a few years later than them.

 

So given that the evidence above shows that they are not indigenous to New Zealand then UNDRIP does not apply.

 

So now we come to the Myth of a partnership requirement being part of the Treaty of Waitangi.

 

This interpretation of a partnership is exactly that “A MYTH”.

In relation to the supposed partnership between the Crown and Maori, enacted by the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, there is nowhere in the Treaty document where a partnership is mentioned and in fact many revered Maori elder statesmen have over the years stated the opposite to be the case as shown in the speech copied below:

 

‘The Hon Sir Apirana Ngata -M.A. LLB. LIT.D’

(THE TREATY OF WAITANGI – an explanation published in 1922)

 

The acclaimed Maori Leader Sir Apirana Ngata explains the intent in the pages of this book, the “Treaty of Waitangi”. He concludes with the words:

 

“The Treaty made the one law for the Maori and Pakeha. If you think these things are wrong and bad then blame our ancestors who gave away their rights in the days when they were powerful”.

 

The claim that the Treaty of Waitangi created a partnership between the Crown and Maori is not supported by any of the documentation of the Treaty although this latter-day reinterpretation of the Treaty is simply stated as a fact, without any acknowledgement that the assertion is hotly contested, and is flatly contradicted by many of the speeches recorded by Colenso in writing at the time (on 5 February 1840) and flatly contradicted also by speeches made by numerous chiefs at Kohimarama in 1860.

 

New Zealand’s Prime Minister went to Paris after the Second World War and signed the United Nations Declaration of Universal Human Rights. That declaration begins “that all men are born free and equal”.

 

This Government is passing legislation through Parliament with the assumption that all people are not free and equal; that some are more equal than others and that some are better able to consider how we get better healthcare, not based on the matters before them, not based on any particular expertise they may have, but based on ethnic background.

 

The fact of the matter is that if we go down this pathway and we start saying that, actually, some members are better qualified based on their demographic characteristics to address a matter than others, then we are going to find ourselves in a very poor place. We’re going to find ourselves in a place where some members are not equally capable, and therefore some people who elect some members don’t have equal political rights.

 

This comes back to this simple idea of equality for all and Democratic Rights.

 

This government is setting us up to be controlled by a system of race based governance presided over by a tribal elite of unelected Maori representatives which will be bad for the majority of the Maori population and also New Zealand’s other races. An example of the feeling from a prominent Ngapuhi Kaumatua, copied from Facebook, is shown below:

 

David Rankin, Ngapuhi kaumatua.

Direct descendant of Hone Heke.

A part-Maori with mana.

 

It may surprise many New Zealanders, but a growing number of Maori are fed up with the Waitangi Tribunal, and the entire Treaty gravy train. There is a stereotype of Maori collecting millions of dollars in settlement money and living the easy life. The reality is very different. Here are a few facts:

 

1. The Tribunal makes up history as it goes along. A growing number of New Zealand historians are pointing this out, although most of them are labelled as racist for doing so. Facts are omitted in Tribunal reports, and evidence is shaped in some cases to fit predetermined outcomes. As an example, I gave evidence at a Tribunal hearing about my ancestor Hone Heke, the first chief to sign the Treaty. However, because the oral history of our whanau did not fit with the Tribunal’s narrative, my testimony was excluded. Yet, several radicals with little knowledge of our history had their testimony included because it fitted with the separatist agenda. This leads to point 2.

 

2. In the 1970s, many of us hoped that the Tribunal would be an organisation that would achieve reconciliation. It has turned out to be a body that is bringing in apartheid to New Zealand. This sounds dramatic, until you see how it advocates for race-based access to certain areas, and race-based management policies for Crown land.

 

3. Treaty settlements make tribal corporations rich, with the help of favourable tax status and often little or no rates to pay. So with these advantages its pretty easy to become super profitable. But do you think the average Maori sees any benefit from this? None at all. I have been asked several times to be on trust boards and have been offered large sums of money to do so. I refuse. History will judge the kupapa (traitors) who have abandoned our people for money.

 

4. The tribunal is a bully. Go against it, and you will be labelled a racist or worse. Yet, who does it help? Apart from a few elite Maori who have become millionaires from the process, there is no benefit to Maori overall. Drive through Huntly or anywhere in Tuhoe and you won’t find any evidence of these multi hundred million dollar settlements.

Let’s be clear. The Tribunal exists to make lawyers and a few elite Maori very rich. It has deprived our people from their birth right and divided and destroyed many of our communities. The sooner it is shut down the better.

David Hone Heke Rankin

Te Matarahurahu hapu

Ngapuhi

 

The challenge now is for the government to defend their position based on their current apartheid based system they are promoting which basically states that people aren’t born free and equal; or

 

They could be honest and dump this system of race based governance, stop promoting policies of division and return to supporting the democratic rights of all on an equal basis.

 

There may be issues for Maori, but instituting an Apartheid system of governance will only make the division between Maori and other races get much wider. To treat Maori equally with other races does not require race based apartheid governance systems, although it may require specifically targeted programs to address the issues.

 

We do not need to destroy Democracy in New Zealand to achieve the desired results just use the resources that we have, wisely, for the benefit of all citizens equally.