Hundreds of people are expected at Ōnuku Marae in Akaroa today to celebrate Waitangi Day – Governor-General Dame Cindy Kiro and Prime Minister Christopher Luxon among them.
Ngāi Tahu’s pōwhiri there welcomed manuhiri in Akaroa about 9am, with events wrapping up about 3pm. Luxon will address the hosts before midday, with Ngāi Tahu kaiwhakahaere Justin Tipa also speaking.
Follow live updates of Waitangi Day with 1News
TV and radio host Stacey Morrison will moderate a discussion on the Treaty with former National Party Treaty Negotiations Minister Chris Finlayson, former Christchurch mayor Lianne Dalziel, and Ngāi Tahu Holdings director Juliet Tainui-Hernandez.
Te Rūnganga o Ngāi Tahu chair Rik Tainui spoke earlier in the week about the significance of the location, and said the iwi invited the Prime Minister to Ōnuku every year.
While Luxon’s attendance was a “surprise”, Tainui rejected the suggestion it showed cowardice – hinting that the Government would not go unchallenged.
“We have a way of doing things down here. He will certainly receive a strong message … his decision to come is his decision to come.”
The contentious Treaty Principles Bill has activated protests at Waitangi celebrations. (Source: 1News)
Luxon confirmed his travel schedule on Monday.
Prime ministers not being at Waitangi is not unheard of but, given the Treaty Principles debate and tense race relations, he’s faced some criticism.
He defended his decision on Tuesday, saying he had always said he’d wanted to celebrate Waitangi Day across the country in places where the Treaty was signed.
“I’m really looking forward to doing so with Ngāi Tahu at Ōnuku Marae, and it’s also a place I spent a lot of my summers as a kid and with my own kids. So, I’m really looking forward to it,” he told Morning Report.
“It’s not uncommon for PMs not to be at Waitangi every Waitangi Day. I mean, I’ve been there the last two, as I said, I think former prime ministers have not attended, attended other events around the country as well.”
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said he would spend Waitangi Day at Ōnuku Marae in Akaroa with Ngāi Tahu. (Source: Breakfast)
Put to him that race relations were more strained now amid the response to the Treaty Principles Bill, Luxon said he had spoken strongly against the bill and reiterated National would vote it down at the second reading.
He also argued National Party ministers would be in attendance at Waitangi, including Māori-Crown Relations Minister Tama Potaka and Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith.
Every other political party leader in Parliament attended the pōwhiri at the Treaty Grounds on Wednesday, with the exception of Te Pāti Māori who had been at Waitangi earlier in the week but left on Wednesday to attend Dame Iritana Tāwhiwhirangi’s tangihanga in Gisborne.
Labour leader Chris Hipkins previously said there was no reason Luxon could not attend on the Wednesday then travel to Canterbury for Waitangi Day itself, and repeated that sentiment at the pōwhiri.
“I think the Prime Minister should have shown some leadership and been here. On a day when we should be talking about the future of the country, not having the Prime Minister’s voice in that conversation I think is a dereliction of the responsibilities that go with his office.
“I think the country is looking for leadership, the country is looking for someone to bring us together. That goes with his job, he’s not doing his job.”
During his speech, Hipkins said his taringa – ears – were not painted on and committed to returning to Waitangi every year he was in politics, to listen.
“Leadership needs to come from the top and that’s why I’m here and will be here every year that I’m in politics.”
Green co-leader Marama Davidson, who returned to the public eye for Waitangi after months of cancer treatments, was also unimpressed.
“The kōrero that is being put out there about so-called privileges is like saying that the violence and the beating that my grandmother took for speaking her own reo, her own language in school is just called an education.
“That is the sort of harmful, violent rhetoric that this Government and the Prime Minister is allowing to happen and then he doesn’t even have the guts to turn up here and face that.”
She said Potaka “had more mana than the Prime Minister today, turning up here and fronting. And the Prime Minister really needs to show his power and his mana, his authority to actually be a prime minister and actually keep his mates in line”.
The event at Waitangi attracted some disruption, with a large group of wāhine from Te Tai Tokerau standing and turned their backs when Potaka and ACT leader David Seymour were speaking.
Seymour’s microphone was also removed twice during his speech, an incident that led senior NZ First Minister Shane Jones to cast doubts on whether the Government would help fund the Waitangi Trust in future.
His leader Winston Peters defended Luxon’s lack of attendance.
“Look, prime ministers in the past have been all over the country, because there’s celebrations happening elsehwere as well, so it’s no big deal,” Peters said.
He personally had attended because he belonged, he said, having been there over seven decades.
“I’m tangata whenua here, just in case some of you might have forgotten.”
Seymour said he’d previously written a column saying the Treaty should go on tour to different places, because it was signed in many different places over several months.
“I guess Chris in a sense is doing something like that,” he said.
“His diary’s ultimately up to him, I wasn’t part of a discussion about where he would go. What I would say is that he’s made a choice and I think people should respect his choice. In fact I think generally we should just be more open and tolerant of different people’s choices.”
He did not feel unsupported by the Prime Minister’s absence, saying “no no no, I don’t rely on Chris for support, I think he sometimes relies on me for support.”
rnz.co.nz
