This week, to mark Waitangi Day, the Guardian is publishing five pieces of commentary from Māori writers.
Bill English once said of Waitangi Day that New Zealanders were bored of the spectacle – the unnecessary controversy – and deserved a more positive national day. The language is deliberate in its exclusion of Māori as New Zealanders and dismissive of our mamae [pain]. Our anger is a bore and a buzzkill. He declined the opportunity to own those words at Waitangi in 2017, perhaps out of fear or contempt that he would be held accountable. We will never know – his party lost the election in September later that year.
In 2017, the tide shifted. Labour spent five days on the whenua [land] to listen, reciprocate the manaakitanga [hospitality, generosity] shown and invest in kanohi kitea [physical presence, represent]. Prime minister Jacinda Ardern, hapu [pregnant] with baby Neve, made the promises of her government to Māori explicit. Her speech underlined the need for the government to be held accountable; a process which National, among others, had expropriated from Māori the year before. The change in tact was palpable – it rippled across the motu.
In 2019, Labour returned. Murmurs of discontent were to be expected after what felt like a year of working groups, reviews and inquiries – a lot of talk; a lack of action. Anticipation for delivery was ripe. But Ardern stumbled on what should have been an easy question – the articles of Te Tiriti. She leaned on her Māori colleagues before deferring to the principles. Her whaikōrero reaffirmed the government’s commitment to closing the gap between Māori and non-Māori. This, she said, should be a ubiquitous goal of any party; not to be politicised but to be measured against, and held accountable to.
This year, Ardern’s speech felt like much of the same. More adept and aware of her audience than opposition leader, Simon Bridges. But repetitive – more mahi [work] to be done; bridges built and bridges crossed. Again, she asked “hold me to account, and I will keep coming back here so you can do just that.”
Labour’s relationship with Māori is of course not solely epitomised by Ardern’s speeches at Waitangi. Beyond the mahau [veranda] at Te Whare Rūnanga, the coalition government under her leadership has sown discord among Māori. This was most pronounced at Ihumātao and Ardern’s indecisiveness as to whether to even visit the whenua [land], let alone intervene. On it went. Oranga Tamariki and the state’s theft of our tamariki [children]. The government relinquishing any commitment to implementing a comprehensive Capital Gains Tax. Failures of Kiwibuild, and the Māori Housing initiative.
The glue that bonds these issues, together with Ardern’s leadership, her kōrero [speech] and the action – or inaction – of the coalition government, is accountability. Ardern found herself on the defensive at Waitangi last year, listing the policy developments made under her government. The Winter Energy Payment was accessed by 150,000 Māori whānau [families]. Māori unemployment was the lowest it had been in a decade. There was cross-party consensus on the Child Poverty Reduction Bill. Increases to the accommodation supplement, public housing and the Māori Housing Fund. A reduction in the number of Māori incarcerated. Wharves, roads and tourism initiatives. Investing in te reo in schools.
Ardern’s speeches endorse an inveterate position in the state’s relationship to Māori. The apparatus through which our rights as Indigenous peoples are quantified is not tikanga [correct procedure, lore], nor is it the documents our tūpuna [ancestors] signed in 1835 and 1840. How well we are doing as a people, how we progress forward is never measured on our terms. It was, and remains, at the discretion of the state. Māori development is weighed in terms of the state clinging to sovereignty and measured in KPIs, the speed of settlement disputes, decorative gestures of goodwill; the discourse of lip-service. Across the spectrum of Māori issues, Ardern has categorically denied Māori the opportunity to hold her government accountable, within terms that we set and define.
Māori, however, continue to pursue accountability on our own terms. We measure the words of Ardern, and her government, against what is tika; what is right for our people. Every government fronts up to Waitangi each year with commitments, numbers and promises – most of them empty. We don’t necessarily dispute the gains made by this government, but we continue to resist the system that enabled the wrongful theft of our lands, our water, our children and the right to make decisions regarding the future of our communities. We continue to agitate for recognition of He Whakaputanga, the Declaration of Independence, and of Te Tiriti, to measure our own progress, to hold both the government, and ourselves, accountable.
Ardern is right. Waitangi – “our National Day” – is imperfect. But the flaws are intentional. Our rage, protest and mamae are much easier to dismiss if the forum designated for such processes is not of our own making. Accountability on our terms demands a reconfiguration of power relations; the return of mana to hapū [subtribes] and iwi [tribes]. With 2021 approaching, our focus must turn to constitutional transformation if we are to bind accountability to consequence. Food is indeed the talk of chiefs – te kai o te rangatira, he kōrero. But establishing appropriate forums for accountability is only possible through a constitutional overhaul; that is the feast we all deserve.
Miriama Aoake (Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Mahuta, Tainui) is a student, writer and Māori rights activist.
