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The Waitangi Tribunal has heard evidence of questionable taking of land around Kaikohe and the Bay of Islands stretching back to the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi.
The tribunal was sitting in Kerikeri for the fourth week of hearing of Ngapuhi’s Te Paparahi o te Raki claims.
It heard from members of the Wihongi whanau about how their land was taken for the Kaikohe aerodrome in the second world war and never returned.
Historian Manuka Henare says that’s part of a pattern that goes back to the Old Land Claims, when the Crown looked at land deals done with missionaries and settlers before 1840 and kept the bulk of the land for itself.
"So some of the claimants are saying ‘Where is our land?’ What was said was one thing, what actually happened was another, it set a pattern that goes on for the next 100 years, land being taken by the crown and then ‘oops, we have a different reason for wanting it now, you’re not getting it back.’ You think of airports, golf courses, cities, towns and so on," he says.
Dr Henare says the Waitangi Tribunal process has meant many whanau have brought out family records and oral evidence about early contacts between Maori and Pakeha that have not previously been available to historians.
Copyright © 2013, UMA Broadcasting Ltd
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