by Bruce Moon
Truth distortion reminiscent of the Nazis
It is reported in ‘Newsroom’ for 11/11/20 that the leaders of the Maori Party have said:
“From seeking to rebuild their communities – South Taranaki and eastern Bay of Plenty – from the ravages of land alienation. From lived memories of the brutal seizures in Taranaki, that the Waitangi Tribunal and former Māori Party co-leader Dame Tariana Turia called a holocaust, memories that still cut very deep.”
This statement is such a distortion of the truth that it is all too reminiscent of the words of Nazi propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels – those Nazis actually responsible for the real holocaust. “Tell a big enough lie often enough,” said Hitler, “and people will believe it.”
The real situation in Taranaki in the 1840s and 1850s
Of the true situation in Taranaki, missionary Samuel Ironside wrote in 1862:
“I have lived twenty years in New Zealand in the capacity of a Wesleyan Methodist Missionary, am tolerably conversant with the language and habits of the natives, was in and out among the poor people during many of their wars, and yield to none in a sincere desire for their welfare. … Not an acre of land has ever been purchased from the natives except at their own repeated request, and by the free consent, as far as could be ascertained, of every individual owner…. They have now millions of acres of land unappropriated, not one tithe of which they can ever cultivate. This land has been a fruitful source of quarrel, bloodshed and violence, among themselves.”
And only a year or two earlier, rebels had destroyed 177 settler farms and homesteads acquired in legitimate land transactions.
The Taranaki Maoris had more to fear from the Waikato tribes, about 1200 of them dying in the ovens of the Waikato for a cannibal feast when Pukerangiora fell in 1831. Now that was something like a “holocaust”!
And then in 1834 the Harriet was wrecked on the South Taranaki shore, fourteen of the crew being cooked and eaten with Mrs Guard, a survivor, offered the cooked flesh of her own brother. Even after 1840 cannibalism did not cease, with Titokowaru in his rebellion eating Maori and white victims alike.
And in the Eastern Bay of Plenty – the Opotiki area to be precise – missionary Volkner was murdered by Hau Hau rebels in 1865, his eyes being swallowed by Kereopa Te Rau who also drank Volkner’s blood from his skull in his own pulpit. Lovely people! Yet that man has now been pardoned by one of your predecessors. Every other murderer in New Zealand’s history ought to be pardoned by that standard!
Selling land willingly
And “land seizures”? Most of the land, mostly wilderness and of very little value to them, was sold eagerly by tribe after tribe in order to obtain European trading goods. There are registered records in Sydney of 179 pre-treaty land sales in the South Island alone, much of that being returned to former Maori owners in Hobson’s review after 1840. The story was much the same in the North. As you yourself have said: “roughly 80% of Maori freehold land was underutilised or underproductive”. And that is today! Imagine it in the 1860s!
Barbaric behaviour during the Musket wars
It was of course in the so-called Musket Wars of 1807-1837 that slaughter, cannibalism and slavery of Maori by Maori reached unprecedented heights by any standards. Among “ravages” in the Eastern Bay of Plenty were the raid in 1818 by Ngapuhi and Ngarti Maru of Thames, reaching as far as Hicks Bay. Hongi returned to the Bay of Islands in January 1819 with a very large number of prisoners, as many as 2,000 by one estimate, including many chiefs and many preserved heads of the slain. The prisoners were shared out as slaves to the families of the Ngapuhi victors.
“Brutal seizures?” “Holocaust?” Come on, now. How dare anybody compare colonial behaviour in Taranaki with that? Why not ask Rawiiri Waititi to tell you about all this, Jacinda – or has he somehow forgotten? And while he is at it, he could tell you about another Ngapuhi raid in 1823 led by Pomare when many Ngati Pukeko and Whakatohea were slaughtered – or has he forgotten that too?.
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Extravagant, untrue claims
Since in general in major land purchases, Maoris villages, gardens and graveyards were reserved to them, the land which was sold was undeveloped, virtually unproductive. and much of it virtually worthless.
Yet we have Sacha McMeeking of Ngai Tahu: saying, “the value of [its] dispossessed lands lay between $12 and $15 billion.”
We have Margaret Mutu saying, “thanks to a subsequent barrage of questionable land purchases and wholesale confiscations of vast tracts of New Zealand … the Maori lost approximately 95% of their territories.”
We have Marama Fox saying, “Over the past 160 years … 95% of our land was lost either by force or stealth.”
We have Nuk Korako writing of the “wrong” which was “the Crown’s massive theft of Maori land”.
We have Mark Solomon saying, “Ngai Tahu lost $12 billion worth of assets.”
We have Joshua Hitchcock claiming that, “the total value of the loss suffered by Ngai Tahu amounted to $16 billion.”
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Robbing the taxpayer on the basis of false claims
Prime Minister, I am sick and tired of the perpetual lies being told by such people, many of whom have substantially more European than Maori ancestry. Many of them note their tribal affiliations, but do not mention their British forebears — in some notable cases a father or grandparents! I wonder why?
I am sick and tired of fraudulent claims being accepted at face value by the corrupt Waitangi Tribunal.
I am sick and tired of government after government paying up on such a basis in transactions which amount to the robbery of other citizens of New Zealand.
I am sick and tired of the racial hatred stirred up by false claims about our colonial past and the destruction it causes in our once happy little country of New Zealand.
I thought it proper to inform you.
On a related theme, we recommend reading this article by veteran journalist Karl du Fresne who, as usual, is spot on in his observations. —Eds
I often wonder what the situation would be today in NZ if there was never any colonisation by Europeans and things carried on the same pre European arrival.
Another consideration worth pondering is what would things have been like if the Spanish or French had colonised the country.
Whatever they may get, it will never be enough. Their hands are forever open for more.
This sort of rubbish filled is regularly trotted out by the so called elite.
Nevertheless unless governments draw a line they will continue to disrupt the country where ever possible.
How much a year is spent on maori elite? no one knows as no government or council will keep tabs on the spend.
It should be possible to put in an OIA to find out? We asked KCDC how much they spent on their recognised 3 iwi last year and they told us.
It is now ten years since Dame Tariana Turia unreservedly apologised for offending anyone over her comparison of Maori colonisation to the holocaust. “I was simply stating what I am sure that many New Zealanders, Maori and Pakeha, agree that Maori have been marginalised from the economic and mainstream of New Zealand life since the mid 19th century and that experience has been depressing for our people.”
I would like to respond to 4 of your points that you say illustrate that the Maori Party lies:
1. Maori aggression: Yes, Maori attacked and killed other iwi and settlers. During the Taranaki and Waikato campaigns some 800 Europeans and 1,800 Maori lost their lives.
2. Selling land willingly: “Most of the land, mostly wilderness and of very little value to them, was sold eagerly by tribe after tribe in order to obtain European trading goods.”
As an example, between 1844 and 1864, Ngāi Tahu signed major contracts with the Crown, selling the government more than 34 million acres (14 million hectares) of land for just over £14,750 – a fraction of a penny an acre.
The Crown undertook to set aside adequate reserves to have been approximately 10% of the 34.5 million acres sold – but this was never done. Reserves were set aside for the tribe’s use – about 37,000 acres – a thousandth of their original lands.
The Waitangi Tribunal itself said after extensive hearings:
“The Tribunal cannot avoid the conclusion that in acquiring from Ngāi Tahu 34.5 million acres, more than half the land mass of New Zealand, for £14,750 pounds, and leaving them with only 35,757 acres, the Crown acted unconscionably and in repeated breach of the Treaty of Waitaingi”
3. Extravagant, untrue claims: Three of your quotes relate to the value of the loss suffered by Ngai Tahu amounting to $16 billion. Given the situation above, $16 billion does not seem extravagant. You say you are “sick and tired of fraudulent claims being accepted at face value by the corrupt Waitangi Tribunal”. Claims are thoroughly investigated and you can read the Ngai Tahu land report here https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/WT/wt_DOC_68476209/Wai27.pdf
4. Barbaric behaviour during the Musket wars. These conflicts were almost exclusively the concern of Māori, with European participation largely confined to the supply of weapons. They are a terrible part of our history and thousands of Maori died, were enslaved or became refugees. By the 1830s thousands had fled their traditional lands, complicating questions of ownership and freeing large areas for potential Pākehā (European) settlement.