Direct line to voices of the past

Ngapuhi's case to the Waitangi Tribunal argues that the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi 1840 (above) did not cede sovereignty to the Crow. Photo / Alexander Turnbull Library

Maori affairs reporter Yvonne Tahana listens as New Zealand's largest iwi gets to tell its version of history

In the north this week, the first shots of a four-week Waitangi Tribunal hearing were fired.

Ngapuhi hapu are taking aim at the Crown in a claim that asks the tribunal to affirm their position that chiefs such as Hone Heke, Kawiti, Te Kemara, Patuone, and Tamati Waka Nene who signed the Treaty and others who signed the Declaration of Independence five years earlier never ceded sovereignty to the Crown.

It is a case that presiding officer Judge Craig Coxhead said is unlike any claim the tribunal has looked at before. That's because it deals with the constitutional foundation of the country. The tribunal's caseload generally covers historical land loss.

Tribunal members will have to make a call on what those Ngapuhi leaders thought they were signing, and further what they understood would flow from signing the documents.

In the Treaty's case, were they ceding sovereignty outright to Queen Victoria, as Lieutenant-Governor William Hobson believed? Or was it something less than that?

Ngapuhi argue their tupuna or ancestors could afford to be magnanimous to foreigners on their shores. Simple arithmetic dictated that scenario because they outnumbered them.

They saw advantages in relationships with pakeha - trading, education through the missionaries and technological advances. Both could benefit from a formalised relationship, foreigners could live here under the protection of a governor while rangatira would be guaranteed their chieftainship under article two of Te Tiriti - the Maori version.

The te reo version, argue Ngapuhi, should be the only treaty taken into account because it's the one their tupuna debated and signed.

At Waitangi, where the hearing is unfolding, tribal leader Mere Mangu says she's excited to finally be here telling "the Ngapuhi story". Historians have done that at great lengths already, but this time she says, it's different.

"Our tupuna had always put this korero out to us not to write this down, and so people have kept the knowledge. This was the forum our old people felt we could tell this story, what you're getting here is the raw material of oral material passed down through the generations.

"It's a pou, a stake in the ground about our history. We want the Crown to acknowledge the truth of what the background of those documents were about us having never given our mana away."

It was important to note that none of this claim was about negotiating a dollar settlement with the Crown. Ngapuhi are yet to engage with the Crown on that score. Rather it was about settling up on history, she said.

"There is no one person to benefit from this. It's a constitutional issue."

But there are plenty that are suspicious of the process even as they engage in it.

In the middle of the week, Anania Wikaira and Pene Morunga are sitting in the type of companionable quiet that comes from knowing each other for their whole lives. The two Te Hikutu kaumatua have been listening to tribal experts such as Auckland University's Dr Pat Hohepa and Rima Edwards.

Their addresses to the tribunal canvass the tribal landscape: Kupe, important waka, descent from the tribe's eponymous ancestor Rahiri, whakapapa links, tribal connections throughout Te Tai Tokerau, what the rangatiras' aspirations would have been when they signed those documents, how Ngapuhi got their name, social and political structures, spirituality - the full range of what it means to hail from the tribe.

Mr Wikaira says it's important to be here but difficult to have to explain what Ngapuhi believe at their core.

"I'm sad. We've been waiting 175 years for this, it's been such a long time coming. What happens if the tribunal doesn't believe us? What then?"

But there's more than just an inquiry going on here. The week is imbued with a sense of drama and performance - and humour.

Erima Henare speaks of the reciprocal obligations Te Tiriti required of Maori, of loyalty to the Crown. That feeling was evident on the outbreak of war in 1939, he says.

"Not many people know Ngapuhi met and declared war on Hitler before the New Zealand Government did.

He pauses for effect. Raises his eyebrows and smiles large.

"Quite frankly, Ngapuhi is surprised that Hitler didn't capitulate."

The crowd roars. These are the people whose tupuna were fighters who took the British on at battles at Ohaewai, Puketutu and Ruapekapeka Pa, over the impact of colonisation on chiefly rangatiratanga. At the same time attending the hui are Ngapuhi descendants whose tupuna fought on the side of the British.

Afterwards, Mr Henare says his relations don't just want a dry recitation of history because while this is an eminently serious issue for them, they still want a show.

It didn't hurt that his performance was accompanied by a wero, a challenge featuring former broadcaster Hirini Henare wielding a musket used during the Northern Wars.

It also draws the conspiracy theorists, the type who will chew your ear off about Treaty settlements being funded by an American company.

Te Tai Tokerau MP Hone Harawira says Ngapuhi expectations about what they want to come out of the tribunal's report, differ wildly within the tribe.

"There will be thoughts everywhere from absolute sovereignty, to a separate state - passports, defence, the whole gamut all the way down to what can we live with in terms of our relationship with government and all the expectations in between. All of those expectations will be mixed up in what people are doing here."

That report though could be more than a year off. For now, that's not the important thing, he says.

"The great thing for me and the 95, 96, 97 per cent of Ngapuhi, is we actually get to hear the real guns. We get to hear the real story here, from the mouths of those who heard from those who are the grandchildren of the ones who were there. It's a privilege."