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A Maori delegation has secured a meeting with Statoil officials after addressing the Norwegian oil company’s annual meeting overnight.
Delegation member Mike Smith says a motion put by his group opposing the company’s search for oil off the Northland coast won the support of shareholders holding $3 billion in shares, which might have surprised directors.
He says his delegation’s advisors from Norway’s indigenous Sami people felt the action went well.
"In their years of dealing with shareholders meetings such as this they have never seen the CEO respond to a challenge such as this. Usually they are quite dismissive but the CEO spent quite some time addressing our concerns. Our objective was to undermine confidence the shareholders would have that the company was doing the right thing withing New Zealand, and (the Sami) felt that was achieved quite successfully," he says.
Mr Smith says the kaupapa has won the support of the president of the Sami parliament, which will put further pressure on Statoil.
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