200 THE CONTEMPORARY PACIFIC. SPRING 1991 of the trust lands. The longer the prob­ to promote a series of events that lem is framed in terms ofmoney, the would make the sesquicentennial "our harder it becomes to frame it in terms year." The commission promoted the ofland. In typically American fashion, theme of unity and racial harmony money has come more and more to extensively on television and made replace the Hawaiian birthright. grants to community projects that Meanwhile, Hawaiians continue to would enhance the sense ofnational leave Hawai'i, the intended result of unity. dispossession. This was not an easy task in view of The only hopeful sign is public dis­ the history of colonial despoliation of approval of the agreement by a host of the Maori. For twenty years Maori sovereignty groups. One in particular, activists had targeted the government­ Ka Lahui Hawai'i, dogged OHA at each sponsored treaty celebrations at of its community presentations, forcing Waitangi, revealing the contradictions the question of land dispossession into between Maori and Pakeha in New open debate. Apart from critical educa­ Zealand society. In 1971 Nga Tamatoa, tion, however, these forums did not the young warriors, protested at succeed in overturning the settlement. Waitangi, proclaiming Waitangi Day a In the year ahead, Hawaiians will day of mourning for the loss of 63 mil­ need to consider strategies aimed at the lion acres ofMaori land and calling on US Congress, the Justice and Interior the government to ratify the treaty. departments, and the broader interna­ The government responded in 1976 by tional human rights community. This establishing the Waitangi Tribunal to will demand even more effort from inquire into Maori grievances. The tri­ self-determination groups, but, given bunal was not retrospective to 1840 the closed nature ofpolitics in Hawai'i, and had no power to make awards, so no other course seems available. Maori activism continued. HAUNANI-KAY TRASK In the next decade, the Waitangi Action Committee took over the bur­ den of protest action and denounced the treaty as a fraud. As the demonstra­ MAORI ISSUES tions escalated in size and vehemence, To New Zealanders, 1990 is significant so did the police presence. In 1983, two as the sesquicentennial year ofthe sign­ hundred demonstrators were arrested ing ofthe Treaty ofWaitangi. On 6 at Waitangi in a preemptive strike by February 1840 the nation came into the police and detained without charge being when thirty-five chiefs ofthe for several hours before being released. northern confederation oftribes signed When the Labour government came to the treaty with Captain William Hob­ power the following year, it stepped son, the representative of the British back from a ceremony that required crown. massive policing. Waitangi was deem­ The government established a com­ phasized as smaller ceremonies were mission with a budget of NZ$20 million held in different parts of the country POLITICAL REVIEW • POLYNESIA 201

(Walker, forthcoming). Five years on, young men with no educational qualifi­ the government felt obliged to do cations, the projects gave training in something significant to mark the ses­ traditional skills under government quicentennial year and delegated the work schemes. task to the 1990 commission. Although demonstrations were Dr Bruce Gregory, both a commis­ expected from the activists, tribal sioner and a member of parliament for engagement in the waka project gave Northern Maori, promoted the idea of assurance that the Waitangi celebra­ a flotilla of tribal waka converging on tions would be successful. This assur­ the Bay of Islands to welcome Queen ance proved short-lived as Maori criti­ Elizabeth II on Waitangi Day. The cism was leveled at the government commission supported the idea with from unexpected quarters. Television cash grants of NZ$SO,ooo to any tribe New Zealand ushered in the new year wanting to participate in the project. with a special dawn ceremony on the Maori activists saw this as an attempt east coast, where the first rays ofthe to buy off the Maori people, but they sun rising out ofthe sea strike Mount refrained from public comment as Hikurangi. During the event, Ngaati more than twenty tribes built waka in Porou tribal elder Petuera Raroa preparation for the celebrations. referred to the Treaty ofWaitangi as a Maori motives for engaging in the covenant dishonored by the Pakeha. waka project were complex. The Elders, particularly from small towns northern tribes, who have a proprie­ and rural communities, are not usually tary attitude to the treaty, genuinely so frank on public occasions, let alone supported the government-promoted on national television. But the most celebrations. For others, it was a state­ stunning critique of all came from a pil­ ment ofmana. The waka is a potent lar of the establishment, Anglican symbol of tribal identity and the seafar­ Bishop ofAotearoa Whakahuihui Ver­ ing traditions of the Maori. The cul­ coe (Walker 1990). tural renaissance over the last twenty When Bishop Vercoe addressed the years had been given tangible expres­ Queen at Waitangi he charged the sion in the building of carved ancestral Crown with not honoring the treaty meetinghouses in urban as well as rural and with marginalizing its Maori part­ areas. But few tribes had enough re­ ner instead. "The language ofthis land sources to build waka. Interest in is yours, the custom is yours, and the revival of the waka had been kindled media by which we tell the world who by the visits of two ocean-going vessels we are are yours," he said before con­ in 1985, Hokule'a from Hawai'i and cluding that "we come to the waters of Hawaiki-nui from Tahiti. The commis­ Waitangi to cry for the promises that sion's financial inducement was you made and for the expectations our enough to trigger waka projects all tupunas made IS0 years ago" (NZH, 7 around the country. For many tribes Feb 1990). the scheme provided temporary respite The bishop's forthright address did in areas ofhigh unemployment. For not please Prime Minister Geoffrey 202 THE CONTEMPORARY PACIFIC· SPRING I99I

Palmer, who spoke after him and right to govern and make laws, was a claimed that no government had done clear signal to the courts and the as much as the present one to resolve Waitangi Tribunal to back off. The Maori grievances. The editor of the government would simply legislate its New Zealand Herald supported the way around embarrassing decisions prime minister and criticized Bishop that favored the Maori, as it did with Vercoe for being "sadly astray" on the the Maori Fisheries Bill and the Treaty immediate past, claiming Maori ad­ ofWaitangi State Enterprises Bill. vances in the 1980s were directly linked The Labour government's assertion to the government and its policies ofhegemony over the Maori signaled a (NZH, 12 Feb 1990). Neither the prime return to the colonizing ethos ofits minister nor the editor recognized that forebears. That agenda was made the concessions made toward some explicit in the Australian current affairs Maori grievances had been wrung from television program "Four Corners" on the government by Maori appeals to the Waitangi Day celebrations. In 1989, the Waitangi Tribunal and the High the Tainui tribes won an injunction in Court. These included successful the High Court against the sale of injunctions against the transfer of Coalcorp lands, pending settlement of Crown lands to State Owned Enter­ their claim before the Waitangi Tribu­ prises in 1987 and the Maori fisheries nal concerning a million acres ofland claim against the government's quota confiscated in the nineteenth century. management system. In both instances, Justice Sir Robin Cooke rebuked the the court ruled that the government government for its handling of the case had an obligation under the Treaty of and ordered it to negotiate with Tainui. Waitangi to protect Maori interests. When asked what he thought ofthat Maori claims were a hindrance to judgment, Palmer was explicit: "The the government's plans for corporatiza­ government has made it clear that that tion ofgovernment bureaucracies and approach is totally unacceptable. maximum use offisheries resources. When it comes to a question of allocat­ Publicly the government made a virtue ing resources that is a political question out of necessity, while taking internal for the government. It is not a legal initiatives to turn back the Maori chal­ question for the courts, and it will not lenge to its hegemony. Its damage-con­ be decided by the courts in any authori­ trol strategy included the establishment tative way." For the colonizer this state­ in 1988 of a treaty unit in the justice ment means business as usual. For the department. The government dis­ colonized it means their struggle for tanced itself from the rhetoric of "part­ justice will continue long into the fore­ nership" under the treaty, and reori­ seeable future. ented its policy to observance of "the RANGINUI J. WALKER principles ofthe treaty" instead ofthe treaty itself. It then proceeded to define the principles of the treaty unilaterally (Department ofJustice 1989). The first principle, that the government had the