The cash is to support commemorative events for "the wars and conflicts between various iwi and the Crown which took place from the late 1840s to the 1870s", said Maori Development Minister Te Ururoa Flavell.
The money will help fund iwi, hapu and whanau regional commemorations throughout the year, and one national event on October 28, the date of the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1835.
Compare that with the $140m-plus spend-up for World War I.
There was $10m of that for "one or more large-scale commemoration projects" and a further $7m towards "activities and events that will bring New Zealand communities together".
But this was dwarfed by the $120m cost of a new War Memorial Park (and highway underpass) in downtown Wellington.
By contrast, the level of government involvement with the inaugural national celebrations for Ra Maumahara - Te Putake o te Riri/Wars and Conflicts in NZ, to be hosted on October 28 next year by the northern Te Tai Tokerau tribes, is minimal.
Rather oddly, the commemoration will take the form of a 90.5km multisport relay race around and past sites significant to the Northern conflicts that took place in 1845 and 1846, kicked off by Hone Heke chopping down the flagpole.
It seems, having put up a token $1m for iwi groups to fight over, the Government has wiped its hands of the whole affair. Except to emphasise that there's to be no public holiday, forcing participants and spectators to either throw a sickie, or take a day's leave. Surely if we are to have a day to reflect on our formative civil wars, then it's up to the Government, representing the early colonists who sparked the conflicts, to play a key role.
And while sporting activities are a part of Anzac Day and Waitangi Day commemorations, they're not the dominating event. With both, the "Lest we forget" message is strong.
Admittedly, as far as the 19th century wars are concerned, it's a bit late for that. A majority of Kiwis are so ignorant of our past that they have nothing to forget.
Hopefully, a generation of Treaty of Waitangi settlements has created a growing acceptance that wrongs were committed by the settler governments that need redress.
But there's still no interest by the Government in teaching our children about this ugly side of our past. Or, it seems, reflecting on it as a nation on one day of the year.
Of course, the English invaders were not the only bloodthirsty, land-grabbing opportunists.
The Northern Tribes are to highlight the flagpole high-jinks at the inaugural national commemorations. Lucky for them, the funding rules specify 1845 as the starting point for events to commemorate, thus ruling out the musket wars the local Ngapuhi sparked off after chief Hongi Hika returned from overseas in 1818 with an arsenal of these deadly new "super-weapons".
By 1840, as many as 20,000 had died in the inter-tribal turmoil that ensued, more deaths than the 18,500 New Zealanders lost in World War I.
In the 1845-1872 wars between colonists and Maori, around 3000 died, 2000 of them anti-government Maori.
What redrew the landscape was not the bloodshed this time but the ensuing government confiscation of 1.6 million hectares of Maori land. As a nation, we're still dealing with the aftermath.
Commemorating all this with a non-public-holiday sports day with no government leadership seems a cop-out.
