Ae Marika!
A column published in the Northland Age
By Hone Harawira
MP for Tai Tokerau

Well, well, well … so it looks like we ain’t going to get what we wanted on the Foreshore and Seabed. That’s a bit of a bummer, but let me lay out where I see things at the moment.

In 2008 we got an agreement with National to review Labour’s racist FSSB Act, but what we were really after was repeal of the Act, and the restoration of our right to go to court. Anyway, the review was completed in 2009 and it recommended repeal in no uncertain terms.

The Maori Party then basically stepped aside to allow the Iwi Leaders Group to take over the development of options after repeal.

Now, on a number of occasions I have publicly expressed my concern about the ILG’s focus on corporate outcomes and how I don’t think that that focus is consistent with the needs of Maori people generally or the kaupapa of the Maori Party (the white corporate world has been absolutely disastrous for Maori, the brown corporate world don’t look much better). I still hold to that view, but in this situation I congratulate the ILG for the quality of their research, their negotiation capacity, and their dogged determination to win.

We had a special Maori Party caucus meeting on Friday followed by a meeting with the Iwi Leaders Group to discuss common goals and strategies, and I understand that Pete and Tari are hoping to have a final meeting with the ILG representatives and the PM before Cabinet meets today.

Now I’m going way out on a limb here because I’m writing this before Cabinet makes a final decision on it, but here’s my reading of what I think is gonna happen.

The FSSB Act will be repealed (great); crown ownership will be removed (great); we will be able to go back to court (great); or negotiate directly with the Crown (great); the Crown will cover the cost of any claims (great); and the burden of proof will now be shared with the Crown rather than just sit with Maori (great).

But, the FSSB will go into public domain (bummer); and at the time of writing, there is still an expectation that Maori have to have basically been living right on the FSSB since Moses was a baby, if they want to get it back (bummer).

And that’s already bringing in a whole range of wildly differing opinions about what the Maori Party should be doing next, from “sign the bloody thing – it’s better than what we had before” all the way across to “don’t sign – it’s not what we wanted!”

The truth is that both statements are correct. Its way better than what we’ve got at the moment, but it’s a long way short of what we wanted.

Now, I don’t know what the final result is gonna look like, but if we were looking at a 100m race and Labour’s 2004 FSSB Act was at the start line, and what we wanted was at the finish line, then I reckon this deal gets us to about the 50m mark.

But the race ain’t over by a long shot. No doubt iwi and hapu will take up the challenge to get this further down the track, and I expect the Maori Party to continue to be part of that ongoing challenge.

Just a comment on Shane Jones and all the flak that he’s coppin’ at the moment.

Shane’s been pretty tough on the Maori Party and has said some pretty nasty things about all sorts of Maori people over the past couple of years. But, and I’ll probably regret saying this later, he’s still my whanaunga (just like the Popata boys) and that counts more than the political differences ever will. Whatever happens, I hope him and his whanau come out of this OK. They’re all very special people, our families have always been close, and come hell or high water, I expect that closeness to always be there.

Ends

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