The Maori Party's decision to not support former Prime Minister Helen Clark's bid for the United Nations top job has been described as disappointing by Rotorua Lakes Council cultural ambassador Trevor Maxwell.
Mr Maxwell said while he was not "jumping up and down and throwing things" he was disappointed the Maori Party could not move on from the past for the sake of New Zealand.
Maori Party co-leaders Te Ururoa Flavell and Marama Fox say they support having a New Zealander as UN Secretary General but say they cannot support Miss Clark's bid.
Waiariki MP Mr Flavell said that when she was leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister Miss Clark oversaw a law that removed the right of Maori to go to court to test a property right - the Seabed and Foreshore Act.
"In doing so she took away a fundamental human right. Further to that, she supervised the biggest modern day confiscation of land from Maori and she refused to sign the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, a document sponsored by the United Nations which she now wishes to head," he said.