Post by Kiwi Frontline on Sept 1, 2020 12:21:45 GMT 12
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Bay of Plenty Times 27/8/20)
There is no wording to base a ‘partnership’ on in the Tiriti o Waitangi, and yes protection and ‘participation’ was granted to ALL New Zealanders in Article 3 - not just Maori as Kalleisha Kawerau-Wade opines (BoP Times 25/8/20).
Democracy is based on giving equal rights to individuals. Giving special rights or privileges to groups, however configured, cannot be good.
Te Tiriti did not encourage bi-culturalism - 'He iwi tahi tatou'.
Further she seems unaware that Maori arrived here by seacraft, only a few hundred years before Europeans, therefore are not indigenous.
In her second letter (27/8/20) she writes of a ‘Maori voice’, they already have a voice as New Zealanders, anything else is separatism.
Maori wards/seats are separate, race-based positions on Councils reserved for people identifying as Maori – how can this not be separatism?
GEOFF PARKER, Whangarei
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Wanganui Chronicle 26/8/20)
Denise locket letter 26th In the Chronicle Tells us that Denise has never done any research on New Zealand. Maori never owned land they only “occupied” it for as long as they could defend it. Maori had acquired New Zealand from the Tangata Whenua through conquest or intermarriage and then constantly fought over it and its resources for more than 400 years.
Taranaki was sold to the New Zealand Company by the few remaining Maoris after the “bloody” Waikato siege of 1830/35.
By 1840 large areas of land had been sold by the chiefs to people from other lands. After Te Rauparha had attached and virtually depopulated Maori in the South Island, many of the chiefs travelled to New South Wales where they sold large areas of the South Island.
Two thirds of New Zealand was sold or had contacts over 1000 deeds of sale are still held in the New South Wales supreme courts.
In 1946 Eruera Tirikatene wrote on behalf of Ngai Tahu people “my settlement is a final one”,Ngai Tahu have been paid off in full and final settlements over four times already. Akaroa for instance, was sold no fewer than nine times! They sold their last piece of land in 1864, and within four years had lodged the first claims for compensation.
Of course you don’t here anything about the real tangata whenua who had occupied New Zealand before Maori.
IAN BROUGHAM, Wanganui
Dear Editor (Sent to the Northland Age & Northern Advocate 8/8/20)
From the words of Allan Duff in the 1991” A school of thought emanating from Maori radicals further reiterated this charge that the terrible white had forced his values, his culture on you, the innocent Maori ”Except you couldn’t push away the obvious evidence that heavy alcohol consumption was not one of the enforced values. Nor had you seen, ever, one of these enforcers stuffing a cigarette into a Maori mouth and making him/her smoke it”
To get to the bare, inglorious facts, that the Maoris facts, that the Maoris are, chiefly responsible for their own woes”. There is a further problem: reading and writing, We, the Maori, inherited an oral tradition. To pass on our knowledge and information as the main means of self-expression”.
“I put the spotlight on it, as one reason to partly explain our failure.” We have limited understanding of the world by HOLDING IN HIGH REGARD THE WRITTEN WORD”
“Without it, there is no chance of making it in this modern world.”
So when I hear people advocating traditional Maori weaving or carving, and claiming them as ‘life skills’ it not only appals, it disgusts. It is quite simply claiming something which is demonstrably untrue. Weaving and carving are not life skills. They are recreation skills”.
IAN BROUGHAM, Wanganui
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Northland Age 24/7/20)
Just what is a fair deal ? The Treaty of Waitangi was intended to simply give the Maori a fair deal in exchange for his sovereignty. The fisheries, forests, and land on which the Maori depended for food were the economic factors then prevailing. The economic climate is vastly different today.
“No longer does the Maori go to the forests or the sea for sustenance, the supermarket has changed all that:” and we are still giving the Maoris a fair deal. To quote just a few instances”.Social security, for example, with its child allowance (best thing that ever happened to Maori, maintenance of solo mums, the dole for those out of work and so on. Then there is free education and the opportunity for any Maori to rise to the highest positions in church and state.
In yet another way the Pakehas has been generous to judge from the rarity of full-blooded Maori in our community, and the pale skins of many of those still claiming to be Maori.’
IAN BROUGHAM, Wanganui
There is no wording to base a ‘partnership’ on in the Tiriti o Waitangi, and yes protection and ‘participation’ was granted to ALL New Zealanders in Article 3 - not just Maori as Kalleisha Kawerau-Wade opines (BoP Times 25/8/20).
Democracy is based on giving equal rights to individuals. Giving special rights or privileges to groups, however configured, cannot be good.
Te Tiriti did not encourage bi-culturalism - 'He iwi tahi tatou'.
Further she seems unaware that Maori arrived here by seacraft, only a few hundred years before Europeans, therefore are not indigenous.
In her second letter (27/8/20) she writes of a ‘Maori voice’, they already have a voice as New Zealanders, anything else is separatism.
Maori wards/seats are separate, race-based positions on Councils reserved for people identifying as Maori – how can this not be separatism?
GEOFF PARKER, Whangarei
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Wanganui Chronicle 26/8/20)
Denise locket letter 26th In the Chronicle Tells us that Denise has never done any research on New Zealand. Maori never owned land they only “occupied” it for as long as they could defend it. Maori had acquired New Zealand from the Tangata Whenua through conquest or intermarriage and then constantly fought over it and its resources for more than 400 years.
Taranaki was sold to the New Zealand Company by the few remaining Maoris after the “bloody” Waikato siege of 1830/35.
By 1840 large areas of land had been sold by the chiefs to people from other lands. After Te Rauparha had attached and virtually depopulated Maori in the South Island, many of the chiefs travelled to New South Wales where they sold large areas of the South Island.
Two thirds of New Zealand was sold or had contacts over 1000 deeds of sale are still held in the New South Wales supreme courts.
In 1946 Eruera Tirikatene wrote on behalf of Ngai Tahu people “my settlement is a final one”,Ngai Tahu have been paid off in full and final settlements over four times already. Akaroa for instance, was sold no fewer than nine times! They sold their last piece of land in 1864, and within four years had lodged the first claims for compensation.
Of course you don’t here anything about the real tangata whenua who had occupied New Zealand before Maori.
IAN BROUGHAM, Wanganui
Dear Editor (Sent to the Northland Age & Northern Advocate 8/8/20)
From the words of Allan Duff in the 1991” A school of thought emanating from Maori radicals further reiterated this charge that the terrible white had forced his values, his culture on you, the innocent Maori ”Except you couldn’t push away the obvious evidence that heavy alcohol consumption was not one of the enforced values. Nor had you seen, ever, one of these enforcers stuffing a cigarette into a Maori mouth and making him/her smoke it”
To get to the bare, inglorious facts, that the Maoris facts, that the Maoris are, chiefly responsible for their own woes”. There is a further problem: reading and writing, We, the Maori, inherited an oral tradition. To pass on our knowledge and information as the main means of self-expression”.
“I put the spotlight on it, as one reason to partly explain our failure.” We have limited understanding of the world by HOLDING IN HIGH REGARD THE WRITTEN WORD”
“Without it, there is no chance of making it in this modern world.”
So when I hear people advocating traditional Maori weaving or carving, and claiming them as ‘life skills’ it not only appals, it disgusts. It is quite simply claiming something which is demonstrably untrue. Weaving and carving are not life skills. They are recreation skills”.
IAN BROUGHAM, Wanganui
Dear Editor, (Sent to the Northland Age 24/7/20)
Just what is a fair deal ? The Treaty of Waitangi was intended to simply give the Maori a fair deal in exchange for his sovereignty. The fisheries, forests, and land on which the Maori depended for food were the economic factors then prevailing. The economic climate is vastly different today.
“No longer does the Maori go to the forests or the sea for sustenance, the supermarket has changed all that:” and we are still giving the Maoris a fair deal. To quote just a few instances”.Social security, for example, with its child allowance (best thing that ever happened to Maori, maintenance of solo mums, the dole for those out of work and so on. Then there is free education and the opportunity for any Maori to rise to the highest positions in church and state.
In yet another way the Pakehas has been generous to judge from the rarity of full-blooded Maori in our community, and the pale skins of many of those still claiming to be Maori.’
IAN BROUGHAM, Wanganui