The Kīngitanga is officially welcomed to the Waitangi grounds and Labour MPs keep up with waka-paddling traditions. Video / Alyse Wright
Mexican Ambassador Perez Bravo, Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, accepted the challenge in the diplomatic corp pōwhiri at Waitangi today. It was a big leafy branch he picked up and he brandished it high.
Being a diplomat, he definitely did not say: “Take that, Shane Jones, for yourinsults about Mexicans last week.” But it’s possible he thought something like it.
For his speech later, he spoke in Spanish and then English, calling New Zealand an “amazing country you have built” and the Waitangi celebrations “always a joy” to attend.
Jones, as it happened, has called for goodwill and less politicking, but the likes of Senor Bravo hardly need to be told. “New Zealand is Māori, but it is also multicultural,” he declared, a diplomatically subtle statement that carries a complex mix of political ideas. Everyone can read into it what they will.
It wasn’t only diplomats. It’s the 50th anniversary of the Waitangi Tribunal, so everyone from the line-up over the years was there, if they could be. And judges “from every court in New Zealand”, said Chief Justice Helen Winkelmann, bar one who was unwell and sent his wife. And Local Government New Zealand.
When Sir Joe Williams got up to speak, he called Ngāpuhi “the guardians of Te Tiriti”. Williams is a judge of the Supreme Court and former chairman of the Waitangi Tribunal. He talked about the Treaty not elevating one people into the sky above another. Instead, he said, moving quickly to another metaphor, “this finger talks to that finger”. Side by side.
Williams told Winkelmann the people who wove a kōrowai for Winkelmann, which she was wearing, had included his daughters and granddaughters. He was onto his next metaphor: weaving is about weaving our stories and our lives together.
Winkelmann, for her part, with all those judges there, spoke about the education they’d all received. The Treaty of Waitangi might be regarded now as a founding document, she said, but when she went through a school it wasn’t mentioned once. Even as late as the 1990s, David Williams and Jane Kelsey were rebuffed when they tried to get it included in the law curriculum at the University of Auckland. Williams is now a member of the tribunal.
“I’m referencing Joe Williams,” she said. “That’s changed now and the Treaty is being woven back into our society.”
But the lack of university recognition played to a point made later by Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. She said a survey has revealed only 13% of us have heard of “the Māori language version of Te Tiriti”.
Te Pāti Māori want to push the weaving and the recognition along. They’ve announced they want a Parliamentary Commissioner for Te Tiriti o Waitangi, who would review proposed legislation, advise Parliament and contribute to public debate.
No veto, no overruling Parliament, as has been suggested, but in the manner of some other parliamentary commissioners, a strong independent advisory voice.
It is said, the other co-leader, Rawiri Waititi said, that it’s no more than what the Treaty already says. Or should that be implies? The debate continues.
Oratorical moment of the day belonged to Ngāpuhi kaumātua Waihoroi Shortland, known in these parts as Wasi.
Waihoroi Shortland, who lifted the oratory most poetically at Waitangi this year.
“I raise my voice, not because I am angry,” he declared, “but because to suffer in silence is not an option.”
He had more in that vein. “I raise my voice, not to get attention, but because things need attending to. I raise my voice because silence is to admit defeat. I raise my voice and I hope that you are listening.”
His wife had spoken before him, so for his waiata he sang, in a beautiful, very high tenor, a love song.
The music’s always good at Waitangi: waiata in the pōwhiri and the wonderful Navy band, who’ve been out and about on both the marae and down in the town. On Thursday, there’ll be so much more.
Music, goodwill and firm intent: that’s the Waitangi mix this year. So far. The Government politicians arrive tomorrow.
There was a second pōwhiri today, for the Kīngitanga movement and the first visit of Nga wai hono i te po, in her official role as Queen. There were a good 100 people in the welcome kapa haka group for that one, including many children. It was thrilling, sprawling over the Treaty Grounds with the blue gleaming sea beyond.
At the end of all the formalities, a massed group of singers assembled for the waiata Rerenga Wairua. It’s a song jointly claimed by Ngāpuhi and Tainui, although they have different versions and are both said to claim the original. Didn’t matter, everyone brought out all the love when they sang it.
And then a kuia – Tainui say ruruhi – glided out on to the atea, and another, and another. Others joined, from both sides, some very willing, some mock protesting. It’s called kopikopi, what they did. They were dancing.
Kuia from Tainui perform a kopikopi, or dance on the marae, at the Waitangi Treaty Grounds, February 4, 2025. Photo / Simon Wilson
Simon Wilson is an award-winning senior writer covering politics, the climate crisis and social issues. He joined the Herald in 2018.
