Covid 19 coronavirus: Exchanging bridges with iwi leader who says marae rule ‘smells of discrimination’

A bill allowing police to enter Marae without a search warrant “smacks of discrimination,” an iwi spokesman told lawmakers.

The spokesperson for the National Forum of Iwi Presidents, Rahui Papa, told the Epidemic Response Committee this morning that there was a “growing feeling” that the Government’s efforts are undermining the iwi.

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The government today removed a specific reference to marae from the bill at the request of the Maori Council, Attorney General David Parker said.

“It’s actually something that doesn’t remove protections; it actually adds them. But nonetheless, Māoridom doesn’t want that. They want to be the same as non-Māoridom with respect to those premises,” Parker said.

The amendments also removed references to private housing or marae, and replaced it with the term “specific private premises.”

And the power of entry without warrant in marae must be reported to the corresponding marae committee.

Dad said today in the Epidemic Response Committee: “While we are doing our part to take care of each other in our communities, there is a growing feeling that the Government’s efforts are determined to undermine iwi, whānau and hapū.”

“The public health response bill that is presented today before the house indicates maraes and uses a totalitarian right of compliance and, above all, a bit of discrimination. Some sentences are being coined that say this is an affront to our way of life. It is also an attack on our path of death. “

He said that Governor General Lady Patsy Reddy officially pardoned 20th-century pacifist Rua Kenana in December for “exactly the kind of situation we are getting into now, that the police entered the marae without a warrant and without cause and wreaked havoc years after the event. “

In 1916, the Crown invaded the prophet Tuhoe’s settlement in Te Urewera and accused Kenana of trying to prevent Maori from being recruited by the armed forces.

“It is very disappointing that Maori are seen as different and unable to control our own spaces, especially in a Tikanga space in regards to marae and in relation to tangihanga,” said Papa.

“The Maori have been protecting their people from generation to generation and we do not see that we should be targeted in any of the bills. Marae is particularly targeted. There are no provisions for other entities.

Committee chairman Simon Bridges asked, “I don’t mean to be funny, but I genuinely ask you this, could you trust you to continue with the meetings of marae, tangihanga and so on? That’s the question. Could you be trusted? To do that?”

Dad said “a lot”.

“We don’t need the Ministry of Health, we don’t need the New Zealand police to regulate tikanga in our marae. If you’ve ever been in a marae, you will know that babysitters rule. And when nannies rule, babysitters follow.” .

• Covid19.govt.nz – The official government Covid-19 advisory website

He said there would be social distancing, sanitation and in some cases there would be a one-day tangi.

The 10-person limit for a tangi was “ridiculous,” Papa said.

“Frankly, there are some phrases that say we should have our tangi in the pub because 100 people are allowed there. We should have it in a mall because more people are allowed there, and they are allowed to have a kai. But for our Marae, the restrictions are such that it makes it impossible for us to use our tikanga.

“There may be people on a rugby field hitting each other and then not being able to shake hands. There are some inconsistent messages.”

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said this afternoon that she had instigated calls among church leaders, funeral directors and iwi leaders to see if they could find a way to address legitimate health concerns by acknowledging that funerals and tangi were life events that could not be postponed.

They were “on the way” to find a solution and the Minister of Health would have more information on that this afternoon, before the country goes to alert level 2.

The government was still working on the details. Ardern said they had always been agile and recognized the difficult times kiwis were going through. She urged that “there will still be restrictions.”

Maori party co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer said this morning that she was “very concerned about the provisions of the bill that propose increasing police powers, including suspending the search warrant process.”

“This is fundamentally undemocratic and a clear case of state overreach.

“This legislation represents one of the greatest violations of our fundamental rights as tangata whenua and citizens of Aotearoa that we have seen. The state that has unlimited powers to enter marae is simply outrageous.”

“Whānau, hapū and iwi Māori have shown that we are able to keep our communities safe during this crisis. This provision is driven by the idea that the state has complete authority over our people when this is clearly not true – Te Tiriti or Waitangi guarantees our wise rangatiratanga “.

Bridges asked about the future of the hongi.

“He’ll be back,” said Dad.

“We have put it aside for the moment, but this is a temporary measure that the Maori have called. It was not due to the guidelines of the Ministry of Health or the guidelines of the Government.”

Meanwhile, he said iwi has shovel-ready projects that the government should prioritize.

At the end of the day, Papa said that iwi should be involved in the economic response in the future.

Dad was challenged by his comments that the government is not working with iwi by Tamati Coffey de Labor and Kiri Allan, who noted a number of initiatives in which Māori and the government have partnered on Covid-19.

For example, iwi checkpoints and care packages.

But Papa said those checkpoints would not have gone ahead without iwi proactively leading them, while lawmakers discussed them.

Allan disagreed and said the government was supportive and that the police were helping with checkpoints.

She said the checkpoints were “well supported” by the government and were not an “afterthought,” as Pope hinted.

Dad said he was disappointed to hear negative comments about National’s iwi checkpoints.