Crown conquered iwi with 'the pen', leaving them with little land to support whānau

Monday, 31 May 2021

Deputy chief judge Caren Fox is the presiding officer for the Waitangi Tribunal hearings at Feilding this week. (File photo).

Pressure from the Crown forced a Manawatū iwi to sell large parts of its land, leaving it with little to support its people today, a Waitangi Tribunal has heard.

A member of Feilding iwi Ngāti Kauwhata told the Waitangi Tribunal at the opening day of a week-long hearing at the Feilding Civic Centre on Monday how the iwi had been affected by the actions of the Crown over the years.

It is the sixth week of 12 hearings for the Manawatū ki Porirua inquiry, which is part of the overall Ngāti Raukawa claim on the historical purchase of 130,000 hectares between Kāpiti and Manawatū. It is claimed this was not done legitimately.

The tribunal heard how Ngāti Kauwhata was well established in the area in 1840, when the land and water was pollution free, but acts of the Crown left the iwi with broken promises.

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Rodney Graham of Ngāti Kauwhata gave evidence and said the iwi had everything, but lost so much.

Ngāti Kauwhata had ownership of a large area of land, but now very little land was in Māori hands.

“Land is [our] connection to our whakapapa, our whānau. It is who we are. When you lose connection, you lose part of yourself.

“Today the land interests left are often only small, like blades of grass. I look at the parks around Feilding, all the Māori land.

“The same goes for the hospitals, schools, golf courses. It's a constant reminder of what has been lost and it hurts.”

Graham said people were forced into selling land, which caused a division between sellers and non-sellers.

“It seems to me, if you didn't comply with the Crown during that time, we suffered the consequences.

“There was a threat of the Crown using force, as they had in Taranaki, Waikato, King Country.”

The land his whānau had now retained was not big enough to sustain them, let alone all the land's owners.

Other iwi members had difficulties building houses on their land.

“I have heard it said this region was conquered by people with the pen and I think that's true. But the threat of violence was always there.

“If the Crown ever needed to validate what it had done, it could just pass a law. In a lot of ways we are still under that pen.

“We are waiting for the time when that pen starts working for us.”

Graham said the Crown’s system had not been worried about customary rights of Māori and with each new generation it was becoming harder to agree on the best way to use land.

Now their access to land and waterways had been taken away, their river poisoned and food supply gone, he said.

Other problems the iwi had due to the actions of the Crown included a loss of culture and language, an education system designed for Pākehā, and Māori living in poor housing.

“The Crown way of doing things is one shoe fits all.”