Are you OK with a radical plan for two governments in New Zealand, one for Maori and one for everyone else, both under a tribal monitoring group, to be up and running within the next 19 years?
With Maori Development Minister Nanaia Mahuta at the helm, the plan has been slipped into the system, under the radar, without troubling MPs or talking to the media. The Labour Party did not campaign on this in either the 2017 or 2020 elections.
Especially worrying is the fact that engagement is restricted to iwi, hapu, as well as Maori organisations and individuals while everyone else will be softened up with propaganda. We don’t know whether the plan is already up and running or to what extent.
What we do know is that Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her Labour Government commissioned, on March 5, 2019, the establishment of a working group to develop a plan to implement UNDRIP in New Zealand.
The report was submitted to Mahuta on November 1, 2019, long before the 2020 election. It wasn’t until October, 2020, that 34 pages of the report were posted on the Ministry of Maori Development website.
All 123 pages of the report were obtained under the Official Information Act three weeks ago.
Both versions of the plan say that Maori self-determination would be realised with two overlapping governments, presumably both central and local.
There will be a sphere of solely Crown governance that includes Parliament, the Beehive, and the civil service, as currently exists, to govern the 4.5 million non-Maori citizens of New Zealand.
There will be a sphere of solely Maori governance, with the same level of authority and responsibility, that may include a second Parliament, Beehive, and civil service, to govern the half million citizens of Maori descent.
The two spheres will overlap creating a “co-governance sphere” in which the Crown and Maori share governance in “matters of mutual concern”.
However, the short version of the plan gives no details about an overarching compliance group consisting of tribalists.
A group named the Independent Monitoring Mechanism, which was established by the Iwi Chairs Forum in 2015 and led by the Maori sovereignty activist Margaret Mutu, as detailed on page three of the plan, has been pushing for an “implementation” of UNDRIP since 2015.
Progress towards two governments would be monitored by a group named the Aotearoa Independent Monitoring Group, presumably the same group that is currently chaired by Margaret Mutu.
The vision is that by 2040, or 200 years after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand will be radically different from how it is now.
- The Crown sphere of government would be bicultural while Maori in the Maori sphere will incorporate whatever “tikanga” (undefined) is agreed upon.
- The nation will “appreciate” tribal boundaries where “mana whakahaere” (undefined) is practised. Much more Crown land will be given to tribes. Tribes will control access to tribal territories (remember the tribal Covid-19 roadblocks that the Government would do nothing about).
- Tribes will control all aspects of their culture. “All New Zealanders will embrace and respect Maori as an integral part of national identity”.
- “All Maori will enjoy equity in opportunities and outcomes”
Slipping in and out of untranslated Maori words and phrases, the action plan is a masterpiece of deceit.
The Treaty cited is neither Te Tiriti nor the English text appended to the Treaty of Waitangi Act. Instead, a re-translation done in the 1980s by Tribunal member Hugh Kawharu is used.
This is the “what the chiefs might have understood” version in which two key words, “kawanatanga” and “rangatiratanga”, were redefined to create the illusion that governments breached the Treaty by denying Maori self-government and that self-government needs to be restored – see HERE.
The Treaty principles referred to are not Justice Robin Cooke’s six principles extracted and summarised from his Appeal Court judgement titled NZ Maori Council v Attorney General 1987.
The principles cited have been created by the Waitangi Tribunal by adding a further “equity” principle. This may be to justify an extension of the already extensive race-based affirmative action in New Zealand that aims to deliver comparable levels of wealth and comfort regardless of whether people work or don’t.
Iwi groups have been working on something like this for decades, prompting a constitutional review in 2005, and a further review by a Constitutional Advisory Panel that concluded in 2013. The objective was a written Treaty-based constitution.
After the official panel fudged the results, an Independent Constitutional Review Panel found widespread opposition to the proposal with 96 percent of 1222 written submissions opposing the inclusion of the Treaty in our constitutional arrangements and 97 percent vehemently opposed to local government Maori seats – see HERE.
Despite the knockbacks, Matike Mai Aotearoa – The Independent Working Group on Constitutional Transformation, kept working on the project – see HERE.
The above-mentioned Margaret Mutu chairs Matike Mai Aotearoa, and radical Treaty of Waitangi lawyer Moana Jackson is convenor.
Implementation of this action plan appears to be a classic instance of opportunity meeting preparedness. Radicals jumped in when invited by Mahuta who possibly had free rein under a naïve, weak Prime Minister with a majority in Parliament, and a large Labour Maori caucus to push it along.
The plan, titled He Puapua, which usually refers to a break in waves, is intended to break “the usual political and societal norms”, according to the report.
In a nutshell, the prescription from this young group of zealots is to let “Maori” do what Maori want. The Government give tribes land they want, and keep spending until everyone with Maori ancestry has the same living standard as everyone else. No personal effort or responsibility is required on the part of those with Maori ancestry.
The assumption with “equity of outcomes” pipe dreams is that everyone will be wealthy. Unfortunately, the reality of such schemes is more often equal poverty.
Possibly the makeup of the working group shows a Maori supremacist government in action because it shows how Maori policy is designed by Maori studies academics and implemented by government employees who act as compliance monitors.
The working group consisted of non-government members Dr Claire Charters (chair), Waimirirangi Ormsby, Naomi Solomon, Gary Williams MNZM and Dr Jacinta Ruru, as well as government officials Emily Owen, Judith Pryor, Kayla Kingdon-Bebb and Tamati Olsen.
Charters is associate professor of law at Auckland University, specialising in indigenous rights, Ruru is an Otago University law professor with a special interest in indigenous law, Ormsby works at waste minimisation company Ka Awatea Services Ltd, Solomon is a housing provider, and no details could be found for Williams.
Owen is Department of Maori-Crown Relations special projects director, Pryor is a policy advisor, Kingdon-Bebb is a Department of Conservation policy director, and Olsen is Housing New Zealand chief Maori advisor.
Has the Maori sovereignty takeover started? Your Prime Minister has set the process in motion without telling you. Quite possibly a costly system that puts you under control of iwi groups is being set up and you will pay for it.