Protest on your doorstep: a Wellington local's firsthand account

Monday, 21 February 2022

Thordon resident Richard Miah has been observing police and demonstrators square off during the two weeks of protest.

Richard Miah lives near Parliament and has been observing the conflict between protesters and police for the past two weeks.

OPINION: I live directly within the confines of the protest. No, I am not one of those writing messages on the side of my vehicle and driving for hundreds of miles to ensure permanently diverted bus routes – I live in an apartment block within the current police cordon of the protest.

Ministers, scientists, industry leaders. Great, intelligent people - but not infallible. Mistakes happen, poor policy decisions occur, particularly in the uncharted territory of a pandemic. That is why protest action, be it direct or indirect, is not only a fundamental right, but a crucial component of a properly functioning society. It holds power to account and can show the mood music in the most important forum of all: the court of public opinion.

There is, most certainly, a conversation to be had around mandating the vaccination for Covid-19. Put simply, it’s a big move. Is it ethical? Is it necessary? Is it acceptable to place minimum wage workers in potentially distressing scenarios of enforcing vaccine passes? All totally valid questions, with no clear-cut answers. The Government absolutely could’ve done more to allay those fears, particularly to those who do not have the privilege of education.

This protest, however noble the intentions at the start, is no longer about asking those questions. Living right among the action inside the confines of the blockade, I can confidently state that any form of intelligent discourse has evaporated.

Police walk in formation up Bowen St after barricades were set up to contain the protest.

* Protest: What is the Wellington City Council doing?

* Number of protesters' vehicles in vicinity of Parliament nearly doubles in two days

Protesters and police talk in Lambton Quay after police moved concrete barriers in to surrounding roads overnight. Anti-mandate protesters continue demonstrating on Parliament grounds on day 14.

No doubt there are some good, kind-hearted people currently occupying the grounds of Parliament. Misinformed, but good.

But to those who shout death threats up at our windows, to those who scrawl anti-Semitic messages on the pavement, to those who are defecating on footpaths in the cold light of day, I say congratulations. Congratulations for totally undermining what could’ve been an impressive, communal movement helping hold government to account.

Growing up in North London in an area with many Jewish residents, and having visited Auschwitz in 2010, I find any modern-day comparisons to Nazism particularly harrowing. These are accusations appropriate only when discussing the very worst of humanity - the likes of the prison camps in North Korea or the detention centres in Libya or Syria, among others. To see signs equating Jacinda Ardern to Josef Mengele is an outrage. The very worst consequence of choosing not to take up the Covid-19 vaccine in New Zealand is the unemployment benefit. Refusing a literal medical experiment in Nazi Germany gave you a fate far graver, and far quicker.

Undoubtedly, I sympathise with many people inside this protest. Their lives have been affected in ways ranging from the inconvenient to the profound. As the brilliant Jehan Casinader wrote, many of them are likely isolated and scared.

But if they are railing against others for causing them misery and grief, where does that leave those of us living inside their inferno? Save for the heroic act of shouting “shut up” out of my bedroom window, I have done nothing and will continue to do nothing. Despite amusing suggestions of deploying stink bombs throughout the complex, I do not have the right nor the temerity to take any direct action. That is, obviously, the job of police (minus the stink bombs).

For a group so hell-bent on decrying affronts to their freedom at every turn, they thrive on taking it away from others. We, as residents of the local area, played absolutely no part in formulating the mandate decisions. Yet daily, hourly, we are being treated as if we did.

Let it be known, the events you may have heard about (the schoolgirl egged for wearing a mask, the reporters abused physically and verbally) are the ones only relevant for publication. If I wrote an article every time I’d witnessed a violent confrontation in the last three weeks, it would read like the script of a film about football hooliganism in the 1980s. So constant and evident that it quickly becomes a bore.

I am unqualified to speak about science, just like I am unqualified to speak about the legality of a protest. But when you are staring into your 4th cup of coffee before midday on a Monday because you were woken up at exactly 4am by a group of male protesters harassing a local resident with learning difficulties – I have every right to be angry. Scratch that. I’m furious. If this goes on much longer, my only options are fight or flight. Naturally, I will be choosing the latter. Goodbye, Wellington. London’s calling.