August 04, 2014
Property only right for right Whyte
ACT leader Jamie Whyte says he doesn’t believe in Maori rights.
And he says the Treaty of Waitangi is just about property rights.
Dr Whyte is under fire for a speech attacking what he says are legal privileges given to Maori, such as Maori seats in parliament and special entry to law and medical schools.
He told Radio Waatea host Willie Jackson that ACT supports treaty settlements when they are about addressing the loss of Maori property during colonisation, but the treaty also brought equal rights for all.
"I don’t believe that in a situation like New Zealand now, indigenous people have a right. But I do believe that colonisation violated rights that they had. People were living there peacefully, or not always peacefully, occupying their own land, and western or European colonists came along and trampled all over their rights. It's not because they were indigenous," Dr Whyte says.
He disagrees strongly with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which New Zealand has signed up to.
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