The petty fiasco that Te Tii Marae has plunged into should never have come to pass.
The bitterness and anger those at the Marae feel towards wider New Zealand has festered and built for decades upon decades.
After finally managing to get tax payer funds to host NZs National Day, the resentment towards a mainstream media who only ever bother to paint Maori protest as hateful and without any righteous cause has helped justify in the minds of those at the Marae that they should charge the wider mainstream media for their annual chance to vilify Maoridom.
Now, none of that justifies locking the media out from what is our national day and our national celebrations, but resentment and grievance are a cocktail that doesn’t lead to rational decisions.
That’s where leadership comes in and why it’s so important.
For most Maori MPs in white Political Parties however, Te Tii Marae’s stubbornness represents too good an opportunity to bash Maori for a wider white voting electorate.
How did this fiasco explode in the way it has? Who are the political leaders of this area? Kelvin Davis is the elected representative of Te Tai Tokerau and Winston Peters is the elected representative from Northland – these are the political representatives, how were they unaware of what was occurring? Why didn’t they step in to stop this exploding? Where is their leadership in all of this?
It’s all very well screaming at Maoris from Wellington, but these two are supposed to have the responsibility for not allowing festering sores like this from erupting.
If we want to criticise Te Tii Marae, that’s fine, but let’s equally be as critical of those politicians who have sat on their hands and provided no leadership whatsoever.
Because this resentment is justified, then we all, Maori and Pakeha, should continue to use Waitangi to challenge the politicians who have let Maori down and make sure the media is there to record it or be exposed as siding with the ‘one nation’ crowd.
Waitangi protests historically drove the Treaty settlements, and now decades after those who said the Treaty was a Fraud, have been proven right, and most Maori have been left out by the corporatisation of iwi from any trickle down and remain the bulk of the impoverished.
Today, Waitangi can still be the occasion for mobilising the fight for a genuine de-colonisation, where the Treaty partners unite as ‘subjects’ to break finally with our imperialist masters.
Those who represent only themselves or iwi capitalism, and that would include Peters and Davis, will have to choose between staying as a US neocolony, or joining the revolution for a socialist Aotearoa.
Chur bro
Hi Dave
So it’s not the treaty settlements that are a problem and it’s not that the treaty is a fraud. Your principle point is that, following the settlements, corporatisation of iwi has let Maori down. So whose fault is that?
Dave is OK LuLu. Each person walks different paths and Dave has explained himself and come to fair enough con conclusions because iwi entities have more in common with the crown than the underclass or us maori would have increased the number of fishermen, not decrease and that generalised through all sectors of maoridom. The conflict arises from having two competing versions of the treaty and concentrating iwi assets
This is the crown trying to deny there was once one version of the treaty
Hi Martin
The media aren’t “locked out” of out national day. Anyone prepared to pay $10,000 is welcome.
The Secretary of Waitangi’s Te Tii Marae launched an initiative to sell for $10,000 “exclusive broadcasting rights” to coverage of events there during New Zealand’s national day.
They would have been better off to make it a national ban. Then we would know principles might be at stake rather than just a greedy p***take.
Every one use to know who had all the mana back in the days girl. That’s not true any more. Time to put some Mana back into parliament.
Rewi Maniapoto was widely acknowledged to have Mana. Now we have settlement quantums which is an extremely poor replacement for Whakapapa.
Money has got every one buy the interlectual balls. Respecting money and and realising it is fake may sound like a contradiction. But not if you understand the flow of money. This isn’t an endorsement of Te Tii marae launching an entry fee because they screwed up there sponsorship model ie you don’t advertise promotion fees, they are negotiated.
It’s amateur behaviour and they trustees should have gone bankrupt ages ago and charlatans keep trying to paper over there mistakes. BUT, we must go through the process to gain experience. My one disparate hope is the trustees of Te Tii Marae recognise there mistakes quickly, and doc them quickly because no one learns anything making profits, all investing knowledge is learn through failure.
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