Waitaha continues fight for claim
Waitaha, the ‘‘almost forgotten’’ Waitaki iwi, is seeking legal advice on the third rejection of its claim to the Waitangi Tribunal as it reflects on the disappointment on the 25th anniversary of the signing of Te Runanga o Nga¯i Tahu Act 1996 (TRoNT).
TRoNT was the precursor to the Nga¯ i Tahu Claims Settlement Act two years later which, through a much debated clause, led to the iwi of Waitaha not being recognised as autonomous, historian Anthony Olsen (Waitaha, Ka¯ ti Ma¯ moe) said.
Waitaha is not accepted as being separate to Nga¯ i Tahu by the Crown, despite it not being a hapu¯ (subtribe) of Nga¯ i Tahu.
The clause 9 (2) states that Nga¯i Tahu Whanui (collective individuals who descend from the primary hapu) includes Waitaha but its primary hapu¯ is Ka¯ti Ra¯ kai and that is not named in either the TRoNT or Settlement acts, Olsen said.
‘‘Nowhere does it say, in either act, that Waitaha is a hapu¯ of Nga¯ i Tahu. Waitaha, represented by the Tai Whenua o Waitaki Trust Board, does not accept that the TRoNT act binds Waitaha to being Nga¯ i Tahu Whanui. Therefore, it isn’t bound by the Nga¯i Tahu Settlement legislation,’’ he said.
In 1998, MPs Alliance Party deputy leader Sandra Lee and Aoraki MP Jim Sutton advocated for Waitaha’s own identity yet the iwi was subsumed by Nga¯ i Tahu, more or less erasing them as a separate entity with the signing of the act. Olsen said this made Waitaha ‘‘almost forgotten’’.
The iwi filed an updated claim in September 2020 and Minister of Treaty of Waitangi Negotiations Andrew Little replied he was not willing to consider the claim because of the act defining Waitaha as a hapu¯ of Nga¯ i Tahu.
‘‘Waitaha Taiwhenua are now seeking legal advice, they want to know if their perspective is correct,’’ Olsen said.
‘‘They have been fobbed off for 25 years. They want the Crown to look at its own act word for word.’’
Lee, in 1998, said: ‘‘We see the jackbooting of people who do not want to go into this corporate structure called Te Runanga o Nga¯i Tahu as a result of what purports to be a treaty settlement ... provisions for the right to due process are being extinguished.’’
According to Waitaha tradition, and used by Nga¯ i Tahu in their 1998 claim, Ra¯kaihautu¯ was the first person to establish ahika¯ (ancestral occupation rights) in Te Waipounamu, the South Island, landing in Whakatu¯ , Nelson in 850 AD. Ra¯kaihautu¯ captained the Uruao waka and his descendants became known as the Waitaha iwi and Ka¯ti Ra¯ kai hapu¯ .
Direct descendant of Ra¯kaihautu¯, Te Maiha¯roa was considered the Waitaha Rakatira nui (paramount chief), a tohuka, healer and prophet. In 1877, he led a peaceful land protest.
One of his descendants Dr Kelli Te Maiha¯ roa said he walked with hundreds of people on the two-month Te Heke (migration) from Temuka along the coastline south, then through the Waitaki Valley, settling in O¯ ma¯ rama.
Much of the land in South Canterbury had been purchased by the Crown and sold under pressure for a pittance by Nga¯ i Tahu fearful it would be confiscated if they did not comply. Promises of being allowed to retain a certain amount of land and the Crown building schools and hospitals for iwi were not fulfilled, Kelli Te Maiha¯ roa said.
In 1879, the migrating group in O¯ ma¯rama were evicted from their land, which they were adamant they had not sold, and decided to peacefully leave rather than face being forced by police and went to Korotuaheka, at the Waitaki river mouth.
After the prophet’s death in the late 1880s, wha¯nau drifted away from the settlement to search for employment, Kelli Te Maiha¯ roa said.
‘‘They were treated like outsiders on their own land.’’
In 1998, Nga¯ i Tahu received a $170 million settlement, but Waitaha Ki Te Waipounamu never received anything.