The day Wellington was draped in tino rangatiratanga flags

Tuesday, 19 November 2024

For as far as the eye could see, the streets of Wellington were covered in tino rangatiratanga flags. It was a history-making display, attendees said, showing the growing power of the mana motuhake movement.

And the hīkoi leaders, who travelled the length of the North Island to bring their message to Parliament, said this was just the start. “Let’s get on this waka,” spokesperson Eru Kapa-Kingi urged the crowd.

He declared, “This hīkoi does not end here.”

All of this was sparked by the Treaty Principles Bill. It’s a bill which has been condemned to fail by a prime minister who calls it “divisive” and unhelpful.

Its sponsor, ACT leader David Seymour, has said New Zealand is overdue a serious debate about its constitution and the role of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

On Tuesday, as tens of thousands of people converged on Parliament, that debate was under way. But the propositions put forward on the grounds of Parliament could not have been further from the 5-page Treaty Principles Bill which states that indigenous and Treaty rights are no different from universal rights.

Helmut Modlik, the head of Te Rūnanga o Toa Rangatira, said iwi leaders were working to establish their own political institutions - to devolve power from the Government. He told the crowd that te ao Māori was ready to establish Te Whare Rangatiratanga, to provide a unified Māori democratic voice.

Looking out at the crowd, he declared unity had already been achieved.

“To those who will divide us, whānau, it is too late. We are already one people,” Modlik said.

The largest protest in decades?

By the time the front of the hīkoi arrived at Parliament, the back of it had barely moved from the starting point of Waitangi Park. It stretched 1.8km, all the way back to Te Aro Park.

There were even horses, trailing behind the tens of thousands of people marching through Wellington CBD.

Veterans of Parliament said this was the biggest crowd they had ever seen protesting.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins, who was a staffer when hīkoi arrived to protest the Foreshore and Seabed legislation, said this was far larger than the historic hīkoi.

Police estimated there were 35,000 people in the hīkoi, before later updating that number to 42,000.

Seymour had seized on the earlier number to downplay the significance of the push back to his bill.

“That’s the same level as a protest about a hospital, in a city half the size of Wellington. You know, you need to put these things in perspective,” Seymour said, comparing Tuesday’s hīkoi to a recent protest about the Dunedin hospital.

NZ First leader Winston Peters wasn’t impressed either, saying he’d seen “far bigger” protests.

But a cross section of MPs, including NZ First’s Shane Jones, Labour’s Willie Jackson, and Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, all estimated there were far more than the police’s earlier 35,000 number.

“To me it looked like a hell of a lot more than 35,000, if you want my honest view,” Jones said.

He put the size of that turnout down to the ebb and flow of politics, as well as a more activist streak running through young Māori.

“In every generation, it appears, Māori will gather the tribes together to reflect where they stand on political issues,” Jones said.

Those views were made clear on Tuesday, he said, thanks to “a very young” and energised leadership of Māori activists. That could change politics, he said, telling reporters: “A lot of the voting power is young power.”

Ngarewa-Packer and Jackson both estimated that more than 50,000 marched in Wellington.

Later on Tuesday, police said the hīkoi “ran smoothly”. The only main concern had been responding to medical events in the crowd, Wellington District Commander Superintendent Corrie Parnell said.

‘Part of history’

In the crowd, there were babies, kaumātua, and everyone in between. Families had travelled overnight to arrive in Wellington for this hīkoi.

Hōri Adams, a father of five, arrived from Taranaki with his young tamariki because he said he knew it would be a historic day.

“I wanted to make sure they knew that we were here,” he said, while holding a “Mana Māori Motuhake” sign on Lambton Quay.

“They will know, we were here. We were part of history.”

The legacy of the day may still be too early to tell.

Ngarewa-Packer said it represented a huge blow to the coalition, and could consign it to be a one-term Government.

“I mean, it’s hugely humiliating for David [Seymour]. He is going to be the deputy prime minister in May, and the world has seen this,” she said.

“He has to denounce [the bill]. Because how else could you stand there and say to the world, ‘I am a bigot, I am anti-Māori. I am bringing a bill through that is going to wipe out the interests and the rights of the only indigenous peoples of Aotearoa’.”

Seymour said those lines of attack were a misrepresentation of him and his bill.

“People are upset by the fact that the Treaty has been interpreted as a partnership between two groups based on ancestry. That’s what’s created the division,” he said.

Seymour wasn’t invited to speak at the hīkoi, but he briefly wandered outside to look at it. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon did not go to meet the hīkoi, although some National MPs - including Shane Reti and Tama Potaka - did.

For Luxon, he said the size of the hīkoi - showing the disquiet about his Government’s handling of Māori-Crown relations - did not come as a surprise to him.

“There’s no doubt we are going through a challenging time, and I understand that,” he said, in Parliament.

But he said the Treaty Principles Bill was a result of the realities of the MMP electoral system, rather than any reflection on his leadership.

Public submissions for the bill opened on Tuesday. The Justice Committee was expecting to continue hearing those submissions into the new year, meaning the issue would still be on the radar as the political year starts with events such as Waitangi Day and politicians’ annual visit to Rātana Pā.