A thousand-strong crowd gathered in Ōtautahi today to show support for the Toitū te Tiriti hīkoi. Alex Casey was there.
One of the most charming aspects of attending demonstrations in Ōtautahi’s city centre is that they happen right in the orbit of our many tourist trams, periodically forcing the crowd to part with a few bashful warning bells. “Trams coming through again, whānau,” a Māori warden ushered, as yet another slow-moving oblong full of tourists in unseasonal puffer jackets (it’s 20 degrees now, whānau) stared in bewilderment out the window.
Over 1,000 people gathered at the Bridge of Remembrance this afternoon to show their support for Toitū Te Tiriti and welcome those travelling up Te Waipounamu to meet the hīkoi in Pōneke. The tino rangatiratanga flags were too many to count, held high in the air and draped over shoulders, along with the occasional keffiyeh for Palestine. Toddlers dawdled through the crowd and a kid wearing a Cincinnati Reds hat, gold sticker still on, held up an “UP DA TIRITI” sign.
“What is today about?” MC Teresa Butler asked the crowd. “We want to let our prime minister know that we want to get rid of that bill,” she said, referring to David Seymour’s Treaty Principles Bill, condemned by the Waitangi Tribunal as “the worst, most comprehensive breach of the Treaty/Te Tiriti in modern times” just last week. “Seymour, if you need to fiddle with something so badly, fiddle with yourself NOT Te Tiriti!!” a hasty sign exclaimed in felt tip pen.
“This is our chance to get on board and act now,” Butler told the crowd. “This is going to affect our mokopuna and our next generation.” That feeling of urgency and enormity echoed throughout the speakers. Education advocate Kala Brown spoke of the risk to kura kaupapa and kaiako across the country, and the impact this could have on future generations. “We need to ensure our mokopuna have a future where they feel safe and proud to be Māori,” she said.
Another tourist tram wound through the crowd as veteran activist John Minto took the stage. “Every movement for change requires a skinny Pākehā and that’s me today,” he said to cackles from the crowd. “I’m really proud to be here to support this kaupapa, because the treaty gives Pākehā the right to be here.” Minto then called out the current government for launching a “blitzkreig” of anti-Māori policy. “It is an absolute disgrace to the whole country.”
Minto continued. “They are using fear. They are sowing fear, among older Pākehā in particular, for their own political gain. And fear is the thing that politicians use all the time to try and get a wrench in, to try and divide, to try and rule. Well, we’re not going to be dominated by the politics of fear. Does anybody here feel fearful?” Everyone in the crowd looked at around at each other, smiling and cheering in the sun, and responded in unison: not at all.
Minto ended on the significance of the moment: “In 50 years time, historians will be pointing to today and saying this was an important event in nation-building for this country.”
As speakers continued to take the stage, that idea of unity shone through. Everyone was invited to have a little mihi with the stranger next to them, and thank them for coming. I chatted to Shavaughn, t-shirt emblazoned with the flag of the United Tribes of New Zealand, whose daughter was there to sing waiata onstage with her roopu from Te Kura Whakapūmau. “I’m standing right here because I’ve got a direct line to seeing her,” she beamed.
Te Pāti Māori MP Tākuta Ferris was the last to take the mic. He left Stirling Point in Motupōhue on Monday, and stopped off in Ōtepoti yesterday. “Now, you never know what to say in these hui – this is my fourth crack at it in this trip,” he joked. “But I just look around all of the people that have gathered at every one of those events. I see that flag way down there, Asians for tino rangitiratanga. They were in Bluff at 5am – they know where it’s at.”
If the crowd only came away with one thing from the day, Ferris wanted it to be this: “the treaty is a constitutional relationship agreement, nothing else. Everyone say that with me now: ‘constitutional relationship agreement’.” We all yelled it back to him. “This bill should be unacceptable by every single person in this country, because Toitū te Tiriti is the thing that’s fighting for the rightful place of every single person’s rights in this country.”
He continued. “I know you’re all here for all of the great things that our country stands for, like clean, green, New Zealand, like fairness for everybody. Well, trust me when I tell you that the greatest chance we have of making that happen in our lifetimes is Toitū te Tiriti.” The kids from Te Kura Whakapūmau and Te Kura Whānau Tahi took the stage to sing ‘Nei Rā Te Kaupapa’, followed by a truly adorable te reo version of ‘The Kiwi Go Marching One by One’.
All the while, another gumby bloody tram cruised through the crowd with more tourists agape, phones out, filming everything. I’m sure they’ll enjoy punting on the Avon and the azaleas at the Botans, but hopefully they won’t forget this vision of Ōtautahi, and Aotearoa, at its absolute best.