A NARRATIVE OF HIS AND HER STORY…

In every Nation, there is a place where we try and catch hold of the place where we presume to be our starting place in our tribal histories, our family histories and even in our own nuclear family story.

The Nation of Waitaha is like this. In the late 1700s during the time of the great discovery of New Zealand by the European whalers and sealers our ancestors realized that we were again to be overrun by these ant-like communities of white people. Where it would only be a matter of time that their land-hungry communities would arrive where they would overrun the locals with demands for land and resources.

This is indeed where our nightmare would have gone had it not been for the fact that our Ancestors were already travelling in Europe, Asia, America’s, Africa and were aware of the spreading communities of poor white Nations. Driven from their lands by starvation and lack of opportunities because of the feudal codes of conduct.

Our collective hapu Elder Ancestors male and female collaborated using a process called Te Whakaminenga / Te Wakaminenga or a collection or group of Chiefly persons, who came together and using a standard of both the Te Reo Rangatira and English, put together the now famous Te Whakaputanga / Te Wakaputanga latterly called The Declaration of Independence of the chiefs of the hapu of Nu Tireni 1834 / 1835

This declaration is now an accepted and acknowledged document of all the Nations of the World, and is now ratified by the colonial government of New Zealand through legal pronouncements of The Chief Justice Sian Elias Dame of the Commonwealth of Nations. and New Zealand.

Then in answer to a question of resources and land, our Elder Ancestors put together with pomp and ceremony a Treaty now recognized as the Treaty of Waitangi 1840. Together these documents then became the founding documentation of our Treaty between Her Britannic Majesty Queen Victoria and the Independent Chiefs of the hapu of New Zealand.

An agreement in principle was made between the colonists and our Chiefs that Governments would be set up where, the European one would govern their trouble making drunken sailors, and the Chiefs of the hapu of Nu Tireni to care for the lands, resources, water, air and whanau and hapu.

When one considers the greater picture, under rulings to the representative Governor of New Zealand that made it illegal for any person European or other nationality staying in these lands to buy or to sell or trade with the Natives of Nu Tireni. Then by this edict, they the visitors to our lands were landless and therefore dwelt here in the protective custody of the rangatira Native Chiefs of New Zealand.

Many problems arose and were settled swiftly by cultural practice or by penitentiary action. These methods saw many of our tribal and hapu members being taken aboard whaling and sealing ships to serve out time for crimes committed against person or property.

A great deal of learning took place and with many small and isolated communities, mixed marriages and assignations took place shifting the genetics from one side to the other. It even allowed for the land being transferred to a half-caste person then later to be relocated back to Maori Lands.